Business

Getty Images By Michael Race Business reporter, BBC News The number of compensation payouts made to people wrongly put onto prepayment meters is “completely unacceptable”, the energy secretary has said. Just 1,500 out of 150,000 people assessed have had financial redress from energy suppliers who forced-fitted the meters into their homes. Claire Coutinho said she

Getty Images By Andy Verity BBC News The founders of a key European interest rate benchmark have said its accuracy could be affected as result of a “deep misunderstanding” by English courts. Euribor underpins trillions of euros in loans and tracks the rate banks pay to borrow cash from each other. The Court of Appeal

Getty Images By Tom Espiner & Mitchell Labiak Business reporters, BBC News Former Royal Mail chairman Allan Leighton has said the Horizon scandal is “unbelievable” and “terrible”. Mr Leighton apologised for “elements” of the scandal that occurred during his time in the role. Earlier, a former Post Office investigator also apologised for not probing reported

Getty Images By Shiona McCallum Technology reporter Tesla will lay off more than 10% of its global electric vehicle workforce. In a memo, first reported by news website Electrek, billionaire owner Elon Musk told staff there was nothing he hated more, “but it must be done”. The world’s largest vehicle-maker by market value had 140,473

Alamy By Jon Douglas Producer, Radio 4’s Toast podcast With 439 restaurants on major routes across the UK, Little Chef once enjoyed a near monopoly on roadside dining. So, why did the restaurant chain disappear? Many of us have fond memories of childhood visits to a Little Chef. Lawrence Wosskow from Sheffield remembers the free

Getty Images By Chris Vallance Technology reporter, BBC News Big tech’s dominance of the rapidly developing artificial intelligence (AI) market is a matter of “real concern”, the competition regulator has warned. The Competition and Markets Authority (CMA) is looking into the new breed of powerful AI tools – foundation models. They include text and image

Getty Images By Natalie Sherman Business reporter, New York Boeing is facing new pressure after a whistleblower reported safety concerns over the manufacturing of some of its planes to US regulators. Engineer Sam Salehpour accused Boeing of taking shortcuts in the construction of its 787 and 777 jets. He claimed he was “threatened with termination”

Getty Images By Michael Race Business reporter Airline regulators in the US have begun an investigation after an engine cowling on a Boeing 737-800 fell off during take-off and struck a wing flap. The Southwest Airlines flight returned safely to Denver International airport at about 08:15 local time (15:15 GMT) after originally departing to Houston.

Getty Images By Simon Jack Business editor The boat race is not normally that relevant to 16 million people. Watching the socially privileged engage in a time-honoured and exclusive duel on the Thames is not everyone’s cup of tea. But this year’s contest between Oxford and Cambridge came with a quite literal health warning that

Getty Images By Jemma Dempsey BBC News WhatsApp, Facebook and Instagram have all gone down briefly as part of a major outage at parent company Meta. Thousands of app users reported issues accessing the three sites late on Wednesday, with people taking to other social media to air grievances. While Meta’s status site indicates most

Getty Images By Natalie Sherman Business reporter, New York Google has agreed to delete billions of records and submit to some restrictions on its power to track users, under the terms of a proposed legal settlement. The deal aims to resolve a class action lawsuit brought in the US in 2020, which had accused the

By Kevin Peachey Cost of living correspondent Rises in some bills in the coming days mean many households will see their already tight budgets stretched further – but not all costs are going up. Cuts to national insurance and increases in the amount people receive in benefits take effect in early April. But regular bills

Reuters By Natalie Sherman & Kayla Epstein BBC News Sam Bankman-Fried, co-founder of the failed crypto exchange FTX, has been sentenced to 25 years in prison for defrauding customers and investors of his now-bankrupt firm. The ruling cements the downfall of the former billionaire, who emerged as a high profile champion of crypto before his

The boss of Centrica, the energy giant which owns British Gas, has seen his pay package rise by almost £4m. Chris O’Shea’s remuneration was £8.2m in 2023, up from £4.5m in 2022, according to the firm’s annual report. The package consists of a salary of £810,000, a £1.4m annual bonus and £5.9m in long-term bonus,

PA Media By Michael Race Business reporters, BBC News Train drivers at Avanti West Coast will see their fee for an overtime shift increase by 380% following a deal between the company and union Aslef. Avanti said it hoped offering more attractive terms to its drivers to work extra shifts would make its services “more

This video can not be played To play this video you need to enable JavaScript in your browser. By Nadine Yousif BBC News The FBI is investigating a January Alaska Airlines flight, where a door plug on the aircraft, a Boeing 737 Max 9, blew out mid-air. A criminal probe was confirmed by the FBI