Guidance

Addressing commercial disadvantage

Published 18 April 2016

© Crown copyright 2016

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This publication is available at https://www.gov.uk/government/publications/addressing-commercial-disadvantage-for-armed-forces-service-personnel/addressing-commercial-disadvantage

Due to the mobility of service personnel and their families, they can often be disadvantaged in the provision of commercial products and services compared to other citizens, we call this commercial disadvantage. Addressing the commercial disadvantage experienced is a priority for the government and for the Ministry of Defence.

The Armed Forces Covenant team is working closely with organisations that provide commercial services to ensure the armed forces community have fair access to commercial products and services. Recent example of fair access include:

  • the UK’s biggest banks committed to allow armed forces personnel posted overseas to rent out their homes without having to switch to ‘buy-to-let’ mortgages, saving money and time for around 265,000 personnel

  • we have launched a credit union service to help service personnel access safe and affordable finance

  • the 4 main mobile phone providers have agreed that service personnel and their families can pause their contracts when posted overseas

In January 2016, a roundtable was held at Number 10. Financial service companies were asked to increase their efforts to improve fair access to financial services and products. The companies were asked to:

  • improve the way credit reference agencies and financial services companies deal with BFPO addresses, treating them in the same way as UK post codes, so that service personnel can develop a more complete credit history and have better access to financial products

  • take service personnel into account with insurance products, so that they are provided a pro-rata rebate of insurance premiums when they are posted overseas and to allow them to preserve their no claims discounts

We are continually looking to identify areas in which the armed forces community is at a commercial disadvantage.

If you feel you have suffered commercial disadvantage because of your or your family members’ service, please take a moment to complete the short survey to let us take account of your experiences.

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