There will still be losers in the PPI debacle.

The banks' decision not to fight the court ruling on the way they handle payment protection insurance (PPI) complaints is good news for the hundreds of thousands of people who were mis-sold PPI. It's up to the banks to show they can get on and deal with their complaints speedily and fairly.

However, there is one group of people who won't be helped by the court decision - those who've already complained to their bank about a payment protection insurance policy, who had their complaint rejected but who didn't then take their complaint to the free Financial Ombudsman Service.

Under the rules, you have six months from when your bank (or other financial firm) rejects your complaint to take it to the Financial Ombudsman Service. But we know that before the Financial Services Authority told banks to buck up their ideas about how they dealt with complaints about PPI (which happened last August) banks were rejecting PPI complaints that were valid.

Across the financial industry 60% of complaints about PPI have been rejected. But the Financial Ombudsman Service has been finding in favour of consumers in 75% of PPI cases over the last three years. We also know that two thirds of those who had their complaint about PPI rejected by their bank didn't take it any further.

The rules say that you have six months from when your complaint was rejected by your bank to get in touch with the Financial Ombudsman Service. Once that deadline passes you can't complain to ombudsman (except in limited circumstances, such as you weren't told about your rights to go to the ombudsman or you were seriously ill).

Of course, it's ultimately the consumer's responsibility to take their complaint to the Financial Ombudsman Service, but I know that many people didn't do so because they believed their bank. If their bank rejected their complaint, why would someone else say anything different?

That means that thousands - possibly tens of thousands - of people who were mis-sold payment protection insurance and whose complaint was wrongly turned down by their bank can't go back and put in their complaint again.

The banks are being forced by the Financial Services Authority to contact hundrds of thousands of people who were sold PPI but who've not yet complained and to find out if they were wrongly sold a PPI policy. But there's no obligation on them to go back contact people whose complaints they rejected to see whether there was a justified complaint. Of course, there's nothing to stop them from doing that. The question is, will they?

Savings compensation limit goes up.

With interest rates so low it's not very often that savers get good news but the increase in the savings compensation scheme limits from £50,000 to £85,000 from December 31st is to be welcomed.

This means that if a bank or building society goes bust in most cases savers will be eligible for up to £85,000 in compensation from the Financial Services Compensation Scheme (and up to £170,000 is protected if it's held in a joint account). I say 'in most cases' because there are some non UK banks that are members of their own country's compensation scheme which may pay slightly different amounts.

Not only is the compensation limit rising but there are other improvements as well. Payouts will be faster with many receiving compensation within seven working days. Those who can't be compensated within seven days will get their money within 20 days.

And if you have both a mortgage (or other debt) and savings with the same bank or building society and it fails, you'll now recieve your savings compensation in full. Previously the amount you owed would have been deducted from your savings first. It wasn't exactly fair - it's not likely you'd have been planning to pay off your mortgage in one fell swoop - and it would have undoubtedly been a bit of a shock for those savers who were also borrowers.

So, with all that good news there has to be some bad news, right? There is. What hasn't been changed by the Financial Services Authority is the basis on which the compensation limits apply. So these new, higher limits don't necessarily mean you can have £85,000 in a bank or building society and be protected by the compensation scheme, they only mean that you can have up to £85,000 in a bank or group of banks depending on how they're authorised by the FSA.

So, to take an example, NatWest, which merged with RBS some time ago has its own banking licence, as does RBS. This means if you have savings with NatWest and RBS you're protected for up to £85,000 in each bank. However, Halifax, which merged with Bank of Scotland around a decade ago, share a banking licence. That means the £85,000 limit applies to savings in both the Halifax and the Bank of Scotland.

In fact, Bank of Scotland's authorisation also covers Birmingham Midshires, Saga, the AA and Intelligent Finance so your £85,000 limit would be split between accounts you had with any or all of these organisations.

And in another change, whereas savers with building societies that had merged in the last couple of years had dual protection (they could claim up to £50,000 from each building society), that has now been reduced. The new limit - post December 31st - is £85,000 spread between the building societies that have merged. Confused? You're not the only one.

The changes to the compensation scheme do mean that banks and building societies now have to tell customers how they are authorised and whether they are part of a larger group (worryingly until the start of this year it was information that could be pretty hard to come by) but I don't think that's good enough.

For savers to have confidence in the compensation scheme it needs to be easy to understand and easy to explain. At the moment - despite the recent improvements - our own savings compensation scheme is neither.