No Further Redress for those who lost homes

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RealDeal

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This afternoon I spoke to AIB 'helpline' about my account - the guy who I spoke with advised me clearly that the redress scheme was only that prescribed by the Ombudsman 12% plus interest paid - I told him that my home was surrendered to AIB following repossession proceedings being initiated and he clearly stated that no further scheme was available to those who lost homes.

Why do you think AIB are failing to follow the Central Bank's guidelines for dealing with those who lost their homes ? with 28k written off I would have had very little arrears and would surely have been suitable for a split arrangement? Are AIB hoping that the Central Bank won't intervene having written their final report?

This situation add's to the stress that loosing ones home causes and it looks like AIB are happy to see this drag on through the Ombudsman for another few years - Why?
 
I wonder if this is just a case of semantics? This redress is only following on from the judgement on Karen's case which was 12% and the interest. Considering Karen didn't lose her house then there was nothing in her case ruling which is what the bank are using. But for anyone who lost a house, I'd hope that AIB will have a separate route for compensation and if not then the FSPO would look at your case
 
Hmm. That doesn’t make sense. I hope you’re wrong but I suppose it would not surprise me.

Perhaps @brendan can confirm if there was any instruction from the central bank to aib after the ombudsman’s decision to also appropriately cater for people whereby the additional 12% mortgage was the tipping point for being no longer able to afford the mortgage?
Aib may well sidestep the issue and put the onus on customers to pursue them. But that would really be a new low.
 
It looks like the FSPO is the only next option - they are only processing the ombudsman's decision across the board - they told me the amount that they wrote off my residual balance and claimed a cheque for the 'interest paid' on that amount will issue - no further payments are required by the FSPO's decision. To my knowledge Karen didn't receive compensation etc... either. they are not following the CB's guidelines as issued in 2015 and are claiming that all they must do is follow the FSPO's decision in Karens case. when will the nonsense end?
 
So did you have arrears when you surrendered your property? Did they state they Would give you the full 12% plus interest irrespective of arrears you had?
It doesn’t make any sense to me that the central bank wont insist aib confirm they 12% extra on mortgage was a tipping point forcing sale.

Did the guy you spoke with in the phone definitely clued into your predicament ? Maybe he was just spouting a generic line without fully understanding the situation.

I’m in the same boat as you by the way. Surrendered property. had 2 other properties impacted last time round which the bank admitted causal of sale. But the value of this property was far greater. The whole thing resulted in my insolvency.
 
@zxcvbnm yes he seemed to understand- the 12% reduction came off the residual balance owed - no admission that wrong rate had any impact on ultimate surrender of home.
Simply restated line that they were implementing FSPO decision only.
There seems not even to be an appeals process?
I think we need to get on to the Central Bank - prior to letters issuing- it may put some pressure on them.
 
RealDeal said:
I think we need to get on to the Central Bank - prior to letters issuing- it may put some pressure on them.
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Forget that. The Central Bank has made its decisions.

A few of you need to be prepared to talk on the record to journalists and appear in the papers and on radio and TV. It is only negative publicity which will force a change of heart at this stage.

Look at the way the 4 people who appeared at the Oireachtas Finance Committee to tell their personal stories changed the whole debate.

Brendan
 
@brendan. Surely the central bank have some influence here? I was personally working on the assumption there would already be an overarching agreement/ understanding in place between aib and central bank for customers whereby if the 12% extra on mortgage was tipping point of forced sale then they would have to be treated differently?
 
How can The Central Bank release principles for redress and then go back on them now? @Brendan Burgess would you think they are worth the paper they're written on now or does the latest decision supersede them?
I have had no contact still from the bank but a 'write down' won't greatly benefit any of us who lost homes and credit rating etc when, as @zxcvbnm says, 12% could have made all the difference a few years ago.
 
Guys if you want change go to the media.

If you want to get it off your chest and you are not worried about change, just write to the Central Bank. It will take you months and you will get nowhere.

Brendan
 
That is shocking that AIB won't entertain people who went through the horrific stress of losing their home or having surrendered their home. As Brendan says, contact the media when the cheques come out. Get on to Joe Duffy - AIB hate being mentioned on Joe Duffy. I'm ex bank staff and this is the route I would take if I'd lost my home. That 12% could have made all the difference - you would have add an extra 250 to 300 euro per month and that would have gone a long way to cover the bills. I didn't lose my home (I was lucky) but I went through the MARP process and that in itself was the most stressful period of my life.
 
I think that those who lost homes must really step forward and be ready to speak about this issue publicly - I have sent my story to several news outlets and I hope that others will do the same. We need to get AIB to do the decent thing and redress us for the loss of homes and property.
 
I think let’s wait and see what the letter from aib holds. I don’t believe that if aib did not dispute the 12% extra was causal to sale and didn’t compensate accordingly that the central bank would simply shrug their shoulders and basically say tough luck to the customer. That would be completely at odds to their attitude last time round and would lack any consistency.

Determining that a mortgage would have been sustainable if it was 12% less is however a different matter. We are getting into very fine lines of tipping points there.

My own case is pretty complex as I have other arguments which I intend to bring to the ombudsman should I not be satisfied with payout.
But if it’s a straightforward case of one property it may be a challenge to convince a 3rd party that the extra 12% each month in mortgage payments was the difference between keeping and surrendering a property. It’s very fine margins.

As an aside I am also curious as to will arrears be deducted from a payout? (Assuming that anyone who surrendered a property presumably had some arrears before eventual sale)
 
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zxcvbnm said:
As an aside I am also curious as to will arrears be deducted from a payout?
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Arrears is only a notional figure - put that out of your head.

Typically a situation is that when someone lost their home, they were in negative equity.

For example -
Mortgage €300k
House worth €200k
Shortfall: €100k

For simplicity, let's say that the capital write down is €30k and the interest refund is €10k.

People were told by the help line, that the shortfall will now be written down to €70k. I suspect that they will also put the interest refund of €10k against it.

So the borrower in this position will now have a smaller shortfall.

In may cases, AIB did a deal on the shortfall e.g. 36 monthly payments of €200.

It will be interesting to see how they propose to deal with that.

Brendan
 
zxcvbnm said:
Determining that a mortgage would have been sustainable if it was 12% less is however a different matter. We are getting into very fine lines of tipping points there.
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This is going to be very difficult because of the Ombudsman's decisions.

In other tracker cases it was easier, although still difficult.

Say AIB had given you a tracker at ECB +1% instead of the SVR of 4.5%, the repayments would have been €1200 instead of €1,500.

If the person was paying nothing anyway, the loss of the tracker was not causal.
But if they were paying €800, AIB could have found a restructuring if they were on a tracker.

But with a 12% write down, how do you assess causality?
If the payments had been 12% lower, could it have been restructured?
Or if the bank had offered a tracker at ECB + 1.5% could it have been restructured?

I don't know how the Ombudsman will view these.



Brendan
 
Brendan Burgess said:
This is going to be very difficult because of the Ombudsman's decisions.

In other tracker cases it was easier, although still difficult.

Say AIB had given you a tracker at ECB +1% instead of the SVR of 4.5%, the repayments would have been €1200 instead of €1,500.

If the person was paying nothing anyway, the loss of the tracker was not causal.
But if they were paying €800, AIB could have found a restructuring if they were on a tracker.

But with a 12% write down, how do you assess causality?
If the payments had been 12% lower, could it have been restructured?
Or if the bank had offered a tracker at ECB + 1.5% could it have been restructured?

I don't know how the Ombudsman will view these.



Brendan
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Last time round for me, they hypothetically applied the tracker rate to the mortgage and based on the SFS i had supplied at the time, they did a calculation as to whether I could have afforded the mortgage. (Presumably they had a way of determining general living expenses as is done for insolvency)
i.e. it was a cold hard calculation. It wasn't an opinion of I 'probably' could or could not have afforded it. The answer was binary. IN that case they agreed I could have afforded the properties based on the figures and therefore paid out compensation accordingly.

I'm assuming the same thing will happen this time round.
i.e. based on the SFS submitted at the time using a mortgage owed at12% less, they will determine whether it was affordable or not. That's why the 12% is such a fine tipping point. Not many will fit into that category.

I'm assuming they will have another hard calculation made. This time I will definitely be asking for the calculation to run through the figures myself.

However - just because they may deem it was not affordable that does not mean the case is closed. If a mortgage is reduced its possible they may well have been more flexible in bridging a gap in terms of extending interest only etc. OR maybe the gap was more manageable generally and customer could have made additional efforts to pay up some more. Basically it may not have been viewed as much of a hopeless case.
 
I just got the call from AIB to let me know there's money due to me etc. forms will be sent to fill in, and cheque will follow (I have a deceased co-borrower so need the executor to sign something too).
The guy making the call didn't have all the info which is fair enough as he seemed to be just going through a list.
I asked was there going to be an option for people who lost their homes to discuss things further and was told that info will be available in the letter that is due in the next few weeks.
Now maybe that's the usual 'if you're not happy, please call the Ombudsman etc' but fingers crossed it's not that much of a fob off.
 
Nailligo said:
I just got the call from AIB to let me know there's money due to me etc. forms will be sent to fill in, and cheque will follow (I have a deceased co-borrower so need the executor to sign something too).
The guy making the call didn't have all the info which is fair enough as he seemed to be just going through a list.
I asked was there going to be an option for people who lost their homes to discuss things further and was told that info will be available in the letter that is due in the next few weeks.
Now maybe that's the usual 'if you're not happy, please call the Ombudsman etc' but fingers crossed it's not that much of a fob off.
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I’m surprised they rang. I assumed any communication initiated by aib was through a letter. May I ask did you surrender your property? Is that what prompted a call I wonder?
 
@zxcvbnm The guy was ringing to let me know how much I was due. I have no account with AIB any more so it'd have to be a cheque so maybe that was the reason for the call?
I surrendered the house as part of an Insolvency arrangement in 2016.
 
Nailligo said:
@zxcvbnm The guy was ringing to let me know how much I was due. I have no account with AIB any more so it'd have to be a cheque so maybe that was the reason for the call?
I surrendered the house as part of an Insolvency arrangement in 2016.
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If he told you how much you were due - is it simply the interest on the 12% or a further payment? Do you have a residual amount o/S?
 
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