First Active drawdown without authorisation

G

Gee

Guest
We are in the process of buying a house – contracts exchanged. We had loan approval with First Active, BOI and AIB. We decided to go with First Active for a 5 year fixed as their rate was at 4.95 (a couple of weeks ago). The mortgage advisor gave us dates that that we needed to have our pack in by and drawn down by (Mon 7th July and Fri 11th July) to get that rate.

We thought we had everything in on time but she came back to us on Fri 18th to tell us that we didn’t get the rate and it is now 5.99 and did we want to proceed with drawdown. We told her we would get back to her. We are not closing for a few weeks so we were in no major hurry and decided to check out BOI and AIB again. We were only going FA to try to lock in the rate.

Last Thurs (24th) I checked FA website and it said that the rate of 5.99 was effective from Mon July 21st. I rang FA - our advisor was on hols but her colleague informed me that everything had to be in by Wed 16th to get the original rate. I told her we had everything with then since Mon 7th – she said we should get our solicitor to write a letter to head office to find out why we didn’t get original rate.

This completely put me of dealing with FA and we decided to go with AIB – 5 year fixed at 5.65.

However the following day (Fri 25th) we rang our solicitor to tell her that we were now going with AIB only for her to inform us that FA had been in touch with her on Wed (23rd) and had sent the funds to her account be electronic transfer.

We had not authorised this transaction with FA
What should we do now? I feel they have completely messed us around just to lock us into high repayments.

Any advice would be welcome – it’s doing my head in.
 
That was my original question - at that stage was wondering if we were legally bound. After confirmation that we weren't we were going to go with a different bank - had everything in place. Of course this was all before we realised that FA were determinded to give us the money anyway!
 
What does your solicitor say? In particular about what, if anything, that you may have signed that bound you to draw down the loan from FA?
 
Our solicitor is going to send a letter to FA asking for explanations - 1. Why we didn't get the original rate 2. Why they sent funds without our authorisation.

FA were dealing with us directly not our solicitor so the authorisation should have come from us.

When FA rang us to say we didn't get in at the lower rate they did say that we were under no obligation to accept this new rate.

Subsequently when I rang again to enquire on the rate now quoted on they website I was again informed that we were under no obligation to accept the new rate (that was last Thursday) - at that time unknown to me (and apparently unknown by the FA branch either) FA had already drawn down our funds to our solicitors account.
 
The funds wouldnt just be sent out without a cheque request from solicitor, this must have been sent in at some stage and the solicitor would have been called before the funds were issued. Was your solicitor aware you were not going ahead with FA?
 
As per Agapanthus, the lender wouldn't have released the funds without a cheque requisition and request from your solicitor.

Your first payment shouldn't have gone through yet (although this depends on the lender). Is there any reason why your solicitor can't return the cheque/funds to FA and advise that you are not proceeding/the house fell through etc?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.
Back
Top