Copyright birminghammail
Martin Lewis has issued a warning over an easy pin mistake that could see you lose cash. BBC and ITV star Mr Lewis' charity Money and Mental Health Policy Institute has found a fifth of people with mental health problems share their pin or bank details with people to get help with their finances. The MMHPI has found that more than one in five people with mental health problems in the UK have shared their PINs or bank account details, putting them at greater risk of financial abuse. The charity estimates that nearly two million people could be affected. The MMHPI is now pressing the Government, regulators and banks for a set of standardised tools, including carers' cards, as well as third party account notifications and payment controls for people authorised by the card holder. READ MORE State pensioners getting second £200 payment on top of Winter Fuel Allowance The 52-year-old said: "People want to be responsible for their own money. Yet some struggling with mental health issues know there are times they can't be responsible… so the responsible thing for them to do at those times is to get a trusted family member or friend to help. "Yet when they try, often the cogs of the financial system seize up. The tools needed just aren't widely available. "The only recourse, often at a desperate time, is to break the rules, leaving them forced to shed the cloak of normal financial protections – putting them at risk of losing money, financial abuse, and worried about being disenfranchised from access to financial services. The technology is available, we just haven't seen it used enough to help those with mental health issues. "That's why we're calling on the government and regulator to convince firms to do this in a voluntary way, as they did with basic bank accounts. "If not, then there should be a push to make it a regulatory mandate. Our banking sector is too big to fail, so it's too big to be allowed to fail the most vulnerable. "We need tools so that people can share money management more easily and without putting themselves or their carer in harm's way." Helen Undy, chief executive of the MMHPI said: "For many people with mental health problems, getting the support of a loved one to manage money is the difference between keeping their head above water financially or falling into serious money problems. "It is unacceptable that people have to put themselves at risk of harm to get that support because banks aren’t providing the right tools to do this safely and easily."
