Pepper has bought my mortgage now wants ID

JohnSp

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Hi all,

I recently got a letter from Pepper confirming they have purchased my mortgage from Leeds Building Society and they are requesting some info from me which I expected they would have already received from Leeds as part of the purchase process. I'd appreciate some thoughts on whether I am obliged to submit the info they are asking for or not.

The documentary info they have asked me to provide them with is as follow:-

1. The original (not copy) life assurance policy documents so that the benefit of the policy can be assigned to Pepper. I do have the required life assurance and have no issue with them becoming the beneficiary but I don't feel comfortable sending the original documentation in the post to them. Shouldn't Leeds just have assigned their interest in my Life Assurance policy to Pepper as part of the sale? Why do they need the original documentation instead of confirmation of the provider and the policy number etc so they can contact the provider directly to arrange replacing Leeds as the beneficiary?

2. They want new Proof of Identity and Proof of Address for both myself and my wife that are "required under the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering & Terrorist Financing) act 2010" and are looking for copies of passports/drivers licences as well as utility bills etc. Not a big deal particularly but Leeds had satisfied these requirements so should have passed the details over to Pepper, why make us duplicate the info?

Their letter states under a "GDPR" heading that as part of the transfer process Leeds provided Pepper with certain personal data relating to us which is necessary for them to continue the management and administration of our mortgage which I completely understand and am OK with but if they are in possession of said info why ask us to jump through these additional hoops?

Before I respond to their request I'm tempted to first of all ask Pepper, under the terms of GDPR, for a copy of the the personal data they are holding on me to see if they are duplicating anything in their request. Good idea / Bad idea?

Appreciate whatever thoughts / feedback those of you with some experience in this space might be able to provide as this is not an area I am familiar with so despite my natural scepticism and wariness I don't want to start off on the wrong foot with Pepper unless I have good reason to.
 
I have moved this from a separate thread as it has come up a few times.

I don't see why you should go to any trouble or expense in providing this information.

You can if you want to.

But you are on a tracker. You are not in arrears. You don't need anything from Pepper as far as I can see.

What are they going to do? Stop charging you interest? Stop issuing you statements?

Maybe send them a pro-forma invoice for €500 and on payment of that, you will provide whatever information they require?

Brendan
 
I can see why a new customer applying for a loan would have to supply this to get the loan. But why should an existing customer have to go to all that trouble?

If they don't comply, what is the downside for the customer?

Brendan
 
AML docs they received from Leeds would be out of date so they have to ask for new ones. No downside for the customer not complying but Pepper need to show on their file that they asked. If something comes up in the future, Pepper may ask for these documents before they will action it as they may be restricted under AML laws without having the necessary documents.
 
I ignored it, nothing happened.

Same here, they use to ask every year and the first 2 or 3 times I did send it copies of bills and ID. I didn't do that this year when the asked about 6 months ago and haven't heard a thing since.
 
1. The original (not copy) life assurance policy documents so that the benefit of the policy can be assigned to Pepper. I do have the required life assurance and have no issue with them becoming the beneficiary but I don't feel comfortable sending the original documentation in the post to them. Shouldn't Leeds just have assigned their interest in my Life Assurance policy to Pepper as part of the sale? Why do they need the original documentation instead of confirmation of the provider and the policy number etc so they can contact the provider directly to arrange replacing Leeds as the beneficiary?

If I were you, I'd either ignore, or reply saying they should contact Leeds to sort it out.

I had a similar situation, when my mortgage was sole by Danske (managed by Pepper at the time) to Cerberus (managed by Capita). It all came to a head when we managed to refinance elsewhere (AIB) to pay it off. Danske said it had been re-assigned as part of the transfer to Cerberus, though we were not told at the time. When I asked Capita, they didn't seem to know who the policy was assigned to. It turned out despite Danske thinking they were no longer assigned, they were in fact still assigned the policy. I eventually managed after a lot of effort to get Danske to remove themselves from the policy.

I think on both topics, you're OK to ignore. You did everything required when you took out the mortgage in the first place. You didn't ask to have any dealings with Pepper, so why should you oblige them with anything beyond continuing to make payments as you originally agreed to? I wouldn't loose any sleep over them not complying with regulatory requirements for ensuring they are dealing with a real person or not. It's not at all like walking into a bank to open an account and playing silly buggers by not supplying information they need: you've the option of walking right back out again if you don't want to supply what they're looking for in that situation.

By the way, I'd say it's never a bad idea to make a GDPR request to see what information they have: you never know what yoiu might uncover.
 
Thanks for the responses guys. I'm inclined to agree that the best thing I can do is continue to adhere to my contractual obligations i.e. make monthly payments by DD, have a life policy in place for the value of the mortgage assigned to the lender I contracted with (which should have been assigned to Pepper at the same time the mortgage was assigned to them) and similarly with home insurance to cover the cost of a re-build in case of fire or other disaster.

The rest of if is onerous admin which is a function of a commercial deal between Leeds and Pepper which I am neither a beneficiary of or paid to facilitate so why should I?? What if the mortgage was sold 20 times a year should I be expected to jump through the same hoops endlessly?
 
Hi all,

I recently got a letter from Pepper confirming they have purchased my mortgage from Leeds Building Society and they are requesting some info from me which I expected they would have already received from Leeds as part of the purchase process. I'd appreciate some thoughts on whether I am obliged to submit the info they are asking for or not.
I don't think it's that simple. Financial firms are required under anti-money laundering and ant-terrorist financing legislation to identify and verify customers and beneficial owners prior to establishing a business relationship with them. You can check out the legislation, e.g. the Criminal Justice (Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing) Act 2010 as amended at http://www.lawreform.ie/_fileupload/RevisedActs/WithAnnotations/HTML/en_act_2010_0006.htm. From what you have said the financial institution in question would appear to be complying with its obligations under the law concerning the identification of customers, etc. You don't have to respond to them, but they are not able to transact with you unless they have identified you and verified your identity, as required by law.
 
Financial firms are required under anti-money laundering and ant-terrorist financing legislation to identify and verify customers and beneficial owners prior to establishing a business relationship with them.

So Pepper have already breached the law by purchasing the mortgages. That's not John's problem.
 
I don't think it's that simple. Financial firms are required...
So? They might be required, but you aren't. Why should you facilitate them in any way?
You don't have to respond to them, but they are not able to transact with you unless they have identified you and verified your identity, as required by law
And why would this be of any concern to you? I presume the OP had no knowledge or control of whether they were going to have a relationship with Pepper, so again, why would they faciltate something they had not requested or wanted?
 
Jim, my comment was based on PMU's statement.

Financial firms are required under anti-money laundering and ant-terrorist financing legislation to identify and verify customers and beneficial owners prior to establishing a business relationship with them.

Is PMU correct?

Did Pepper not establish a business relationship with John when they bought his mortgage?
 
So? They might be required, but you aren't. Why should you facilitate them in any way?

It will take a few years, but eventually the will be required to hand over the list of person they have failed to identify to the authorities as potential money launderers. And once you get on those databases it will be a problem for you and getting yourself off those databases is not easy, I can tell you from experience.
 
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And once you get on those databases it will be a problem for you...
In what way will it be a problem? Do you have an actual example of this? The regulations - and sanctions - are for the banks, not their customers. Unless you can point to something that says the it isn't?
 
Hi Jim

Would this be similar to a bad credit rating?

As an ordinary punter with a mortgage and a few investments, do I need to be worried about these databases?

For example, if I wanted to switch my mortgage from Pepper to AIB, is there a possibility that AIB might say "Sorry, you are flagged up as a risk on the AML database"?

If that is the case, then it's probably worth the hassle to comply with Pepper's request.

Brendan
 
How can they put "you" on a blacklist if they haven't legally established your identity?
 
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