NatWest and RBS to cancel 1,000s of PPI policies – check if you need yours

The banks, which are part of the RBS Group, offer PPI policies on their credit cards, and on a NatWest home equity loan. RBS also provides credit cards for Direct Line, Lombard and Mint, and offers PPI on these products, as well as on a Direct Line mortgage. Anyone with a policy will no longer pay for it (payments stopped being taken on Monday 30 September), though the cover will continue until 29 December 2019.

PPI, which stands for payment protection insurance, isn't necessarily a bad product (though it was of course mis-sold to many and billions of pounds was paid out to customers before the reclaiming deadline of Thursday 29 August). It is typically designed to help people keep up payments, such as for a loan or credit card, for a short period if they're unable to work because of illness, an accident or redundancy.

For many people though, it could be unnecessary. If you have savings set aside for example, you may feel that PPI is not needed because you could continue repayments even if your income plummeted.

See our PPI: Can I still reclaim? guide for a full run-down of what it was and how it was mis-sold.

How do I know if I still need the policy?

If you don't want your PPI policy anymore you don't need to do anything, but if you do, you'll have to go to another provider.

If you want more information, or want to find out whether PPI is the right product for you, you could seek advice from places such as the Money Advice Service.

MoneySavingExpert.com doesn't offer a guide on which PPI policies are the best to take out, so to compare policies it'd be best to try using price comparison sites.

RBS says customers who have concerns about the closure of the policy can contact it on 0370 333 9091.

Why are NatWest and RBS getting rid of their PPI policies?

The banks say that the decision to cancel PPI policies has been a commercial one.

The letters written to customers say: "We regularly review the products we offer and, after careful consideration, we've decided to close your PPI policy to simplify our insurance range."