It's the norm in the personal loan industry. The Competition Commission are investigating PPI at present at the behest of the Office of Fair Trading so we'll see what the outcome is. Pesently the industry is 'trapped' at present with the banks making a loss on much of their personal loan lending hence the focus on PPI. Of course by (i) charging the PPI up front; and (ii) adding it to the loan; this is the difference between profit and loss hence a lot of the lenders push it hard. Worse still, if the loan is paid off early, little of the PPI premium can be recovered. Oh, as a final thought, taking PPI through the lender is a lot more expensive than buying it independently.