Ulster Prime Time report on Ulster Bank customer who lost tracker

No. She got hers back without having to request a Final Response letter from the bank within about a month. It took me over a year (not long in the bigger scheme of things) to get a finding from the FSO. Ulster Bank never accepted any liability, they just didnt appeal the findings.
 
I wonder do the FSO have a full understanding of the financial impact of these things - and I'm not sure they do - €25,000 is a lot of money, but it's not when you look at what a tracker is worth. It is double what the bank offered so maybe they thought that was enough.

I was told by three separate people in the office on two occasions that there were no calculations & neither did the data protection request turn any up so as astonishing as it seems, that's what did happen.

I can understand that the bank fights hard and even dirty, to me that the FSO cannot or will not calculate a compensation figure beggars belief. Why ?
 
"For anyone who has engaged someone to do it for them, which can be a sensible choice, they're paying fees to retrieve their own money."


Notabene,

Well done on telling your story so articulately last week.

I was in the "lucky" position to be given my tracker back but only after paying a professional 20% of my UB overpayments to retrieve my own money.
Not once did UB admit liability. I also never received a statement indicating how they came to calculate my refund......my refund was simply lodged to my bank account.
Even though my tracker has been restored, I have recently emailed UB asking whether my case is being included under the Central Bank review and I haven't heard a dickey bird from them. May I ask what UB email address (if any) worked for you?

At the very least, I feel UB should be made liable for the fees I incurred in getting my tracker back and I have absolutely no idea how to even go about this.

I wish you all the very best in your quest to get your tracker rightfully returned to you.
 
Thank you!

I don't know, it's a good question!

As far as I understand generally in Irish Law there aren't 'punitive damages' that you would see in the U.S. - in damages here it's really to return you to the portion you should have been in had the breach not occurred, but they still aren't doing that.
 
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"For anyone who has engaged someone to do it for them, which can be a sensible choice, they're paying fees to retrieve their own money."


Notabene,

Well done on telling your story so articulately last week.

I was in the "lucky" position to be given my tracker back but only after paying a professional 20% of my UB overpayments to retrieve my own money.
Not once did UB admit liability. I also never received a statement indicating how they came to calculate my refund......my refund was simply lodged to my bank account.
Even though my tracker has been restored, I have recently emailed UB asking whether my case is being included under the Central Bank review and I haven't heard a dickey bird from them. May I ask what UB email address (if any) worked for you?

At the very least, I feel UB should be made liable for the fees I incurred in getting my tracker back and I have absolutely no idea how to even go about this.

I wish you all the very best in your quest to get your tracker rightfully returned to you.


Thank you!

Congratulations on getting it back, that is something at least. But I do agree, at the very least, you should not be out of pocket for paying someone to get the fees back.

I have used [email protected] -
 
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Notabene

That's the email I've used.....I shall be sending another one shortly, thank you for that!
 
Not at al
Notabene

That's the email I've used.....I shall be sending another one shortly, thank you for that!


Not at all, strongly worded and with a deadline and just pester them - that has been what I have been doing
 
For me that is a pie in the sky figure that was announced back in April. This topic has come further since. Going by case above they have absolutely no idea what the cost will be and they will try get away with paying as low as possible by manipulating its client. Hopefully the CB can stop that, unlike the FSO did!!!
 
I would have thought that the additional staff and supervision costs alone would have cost €5m.

Presumably some people will get their trackers back and refunds.

But they probably don't have to account for the future cost of giving people back trackers.

I wonder if the €5m is the expected fine from the Central Bank?

Brendan
 
I read it as they had set aside €5 million for carrying out the review, but perhaps I understood that incorrectly
 
Actually the figure of €5 million is mentioned twice in the article:

This investigation is part of its administrative sanctions procedure and could lead to a fine of up to €5 million for the bank, although this sum would be reduced if Ulster Bank co-operates and agrees a settlement with the regulator.


Then later on the article says

Ulster Bank has set aside €5 million to cover the costs of this review.
 
A fine of €5m is extremely serious and would affect the reputation of UB and parent RBS
It would affect the share price and RBS valuation.
Maybe heads in UB would have to roll.
Even provisioning for such a fine is serious.

RTE http://www.rte.ie/news/business/2016/0429/785041-ulster-bank-results/

Ulster Bank is facing possible enforcement action by regulators over the controversial tracker issue.
This means it could face a fine of €5m or more if it is found to have breached consumer protection rules.


The figure of €5m seems to originate here
http://www.ise.ie/app/announcementDetails.aspx?ID=12797263

where a figure of €5m is mentioned in litigation costs:
Appendix 1 Ulster Bank RoI
Litigation and conduct costs €5m
 
Spoke to a Bank Official today - I had written to them prior to my holidays in June, after they had sent out their form letter, and had received no reply when I got back last week. I wrote to them on Monday looking for a reply to be in my hand today - it wasn't but they did send an email and were asking to contact by phone - and saying that they did 'empathise' with the situation as i was saying I am finding it particularly stressful at the moment, I need to make some big financial decisions and can't until this is sorted.

So I did let them ring, though I prefer to do all communication in writing these days - utterly pointless - they are still saying they have no timescales, that they can't provide any information and couldn't give any even if they had it.

Had to hang up as I was just too upset by this utter nonsense - but it is crazy that they are allowed away with such behaviour - Ulster had said in their letter in June, they would have updates every 60 days, so their next would be due in about 2 weeks, their report is due to the central bank at the end of September, they would have to have have quite a lot of that work done at this stage.
 
Thanks for your updates on this Issue
Im also Ulster Bank and awaiting update. CB update must be due this week?

When you say report is due to the CB at end of September, are they due to have identified all cases or have their action plan finalised?
Im concerned at seemingly lack of transparency, timescale, process, details of oversight, appeal mechanism etc for this whole process??
 
They are to send in a report of their customers identified, as far as I understand to the Central Bank

I would agree - not transparent at all - and to say there is no timescale is rubbish because basic project management would indicate there would have to be some sort of plan in order to carry it out properly.

The Central Bank said there would be a further up date at the end of July, so I would presume Friday. A further letter from Ulster Bank should be due approx 8th August as that would be 60 days from their June letter where they said there would be an update at least every 60 days - at this stage I wouldn't hold out any great hope of it being illuminating however.
 
If anyone can get a look at the RBS results today would be interesting to see if a provision has been made to cover the tracker investigation with Ulster apart from the €5M already announced
 
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