Claimant lawyers have hailed what they call a landmark victory after appeal judges allowed mis-sold car finance cases to be grouped together as one class action. The Court of Appeal today upheld the High Court’s decision that thousands of claims can be conveniently dealt with under eight ‘omnibus’ claim forms.

More than 5,000 claimants served a single, generic particulars of claims against eight motor finance companies alleging they failed to make sufficient disclosure of commission arrangements with car dealers.

The decision was about procedure rather than liability. If the court were to allow fact-sensitive claims to be managed collectively, this would make it easier for lawyers to bring these cases and potentially attract more clients to join.

The Financial Conduct Authority has suggested that people eligible to claim for mis-sold motor finance should use its own redress scheme, but the timescale for receiving compensation is still unclear and the scheme faces a legal challenge from both lenders and the claimant lobby.