The whole complexity and problems centre on the fact that there were not standard letters. There were a whole a variety of different letters at any point in time. In addition letters changed over time. What people were told by Bank staff differed. Though the Banks might well now seek with hindsight to portray letters as standard, and use terminology now that was not applied at the time, and sought to justify the denial of trackers on that basis.
The previous post sets out a 2010 letter in one case. Letters in 2006, 2007 were fundamentally different. It also differed between Ulster Bank and First Active pre and post the integration of First Active into Ulster Bank. As I understand the specific investigation by the CB into Ulster Bank announced earlier this year centred specifically on those First Active customers who were integrated into Ulster Bank. The letters that FA customers signed were different to UB letters, yet UB sought to portray and use them as if they were UB letters and sough to apply the UB process and deny trackers. This is in addition to the wider tracker review that the CB has requested Banks to perform.
In particular the para quoted in bold in the previous post was NOT included in letters provided by First Active in earlier years. In fact the very opposite, the letters provided that one of the options was a tracker, albeit it used the term prevailing (at times). That word has caused confusion and is open to different interpretations vis a vis what time it is referring to, what happens when the bank no longer provided trackers to the general market, etc.
The para in bold in the earlier post to me seems clear and if someone signed up to that I see it as hard to argue otherwise, unless there is other material or contradictory information. It clearly states that the tracker will no longer be available. Fact is many many letters said nothing of the sort.
The bank also interchanged the terms standard variable rate and variable rate when in fact they do not mean the same thing. SVR is one form of variable rate, as a tracker rate is a variable rate. UB sought to argue that the term variable rate was SVR, even though a tracker is also a variable rate. There have been contradictory ruling from the FSO, generally Bank friendly.
The Banks also argued that they no longer offered trackers as another excuse to deny trackers. This is despite the fact that the FSO ruled that was not a valid argument, though each case differed.