Fergus Muirhead answers your consumer questions

I'm Fergus Muirhead and I'm here to answer any questions you may have about any money or consumer issues.

I'll be dealing with a selection of your queries every other Wednesday on Scotland Live, on Reporting Scotland and here on the BBC Scotland news website.

Please drop me a line here at fergus@bbc.co.uk with your questions.

You can also read more on money and consumer issues on my blog at www.moneysucks.net.

Q. I have received a letter from the Woolwich saying that my loan is scheduled for maturity within the next six weeks and I need to pay the outstanding amount. I took out a 20-year mortgage loan (Woolwich) and a 20-year endowment policy (to pay off the loan) with Woolwich Life (now Barclays) which both finish in September 2011. During the 20 years I have had a couple of deals to lower the interest rate but at no time was I given to understand that this would mean my length of the loan would be reduced and therefore I would have to pay the outstanding loan before the endowment had matured. Can you please advise what I should do as I am not in the position to pay off the loan until the endowment policy matures next year. I have written to the Woolwich to ask what is going on, but to date I have not had a reply. Jenny Delgado.

Q. I am a married senior citizen who is trying to be responsible by preparing an incomes and expenditure budget for next year. I have a question that hopefully you can help me with. My understanding is that any basic state pension increase for the following year (commencing April 2011), is set to be based on RPI during September of the previous year (2010). I have read that the RPI measure of inflation as at September 2010 was 4.6 %. Based on that, can I therefore budget for a 4.6% increase in my basic state pension income effective from April 2011? David

Q. The ceiling in the hall of our 100-year-old semi in Burntisland collapsed suddenly in June of this year. It was an old lathe and plaster ceiling but had no obvious cracks or any other sign of weakness. We have home insurance with RAC Direct who operate under the name of London and Edinburgh Insurance. They rejected our claim for compensation because the collapse did not happen as the result of a "peril", covered by the policy such as fire, storm, flood or water escaping. My wife and I think that this is very unfair and it seems to render our insurance policy useless if it does not cover unforeseen events like this. I have pursued the issue with the company but to no avail. Perhaps you should take the opportunity to warn viewers on Wednesday that if their ceiling collapses then they may not be covered.

Q. I have a three-year-old grandson and up until now I have bought him £100 worth of premium bonds for his Christmas every year. Is this a good idea or would I be better off putting the money into another type of account for his future?