Quality of Service with your Bank

Hi,
We in the middle of getting a mortgage.

I have never pulled my hair out 17 times because the quality of service from the bank we are dealing with is so bad. Things like the person who we are dealing goes on holidays so then you are dealing with someone else who has never even spoken to the first person. Or they ask you for forms you have already given. Or you ask them what is outstanding and you are told two things then you do those two things and they tell you more things and you are thinking why they didn't tell you about them earlier.

Anyway, completely unprofessional.

I would love to change and go with someone else we are too far down and need to close soon.

Please comfort me, I am in pain.

Note actual bank deliberately not mentioned.

Had the exact same. Absolutely shocking, shocking behaviour, considering the amount you'll effectively hand over to them over the course of the term. Banks are just the worst, period.

Take comfort it this: persevere a little more, and soon, it will all be over. And trust me, you'll completely forget about it, never, ever think about it again, and will instead be blissfully ensconced in the new abode, enjoying life to the fullest.

And if you want to put the experience to a positive use, harness your rage to endeavour to overpay as much as you can afford each month (assuming you're on variable), thereby reducing their profit as much as possible over the term.

Tim Robbins said:

Hi,
Note actual bank deliberately not mentioned.

Click to expand...

For the most part, this seems to be happening with all the banks, just some more than others.
My understanding of the current bank lending targets is that they have to "approve" X amount of mortgages, but nothing said about actual draw downs.

Tim - Very same experience at the moment. The level of service is nothing short of shocking. I'm going to go right ahead and name the bank - AIB direct mortgages - HQ in Naas.

Level of "service" in banks, imo, has always been shocking.

When I shopped for mortgage in 2003 as a single female I was asked by more than one but none as blatant as a fellow female mortgage consultant "ah sure is there no man to go on the application with you? The bank likes to see a couples names, even if hes NOT WORKING!!!!" I can't print my reply but my car loan & current acct was closed within a week.

If you think the service is bad now, God forbid if you go into arrears during the term of your mortgage. When I bought my house it was one of the most stressful times - made even worse by bank incompedence. That was a few years ago so I shutter to think what the service is like now.

Yes the banks weren't over gone on single people taking out mortgages. They weren't too gone on seperated people taking moortgages out either, espcially if you weren't legally divorced.

The only experience I can compare my experience with the bank is the public health service.

- people you are dealing with go on holidays without telling you
- don't answer their phone. very slow to return calls.
- keep making mistakes with forms.
- keep making mistakes with offer letters.
- are inflexible about when they can meet you
- are never sure what you have to provide. Everything is a drip feed.
- make it very difficult for you to get your insurance with anyone else other than them
- cannot update you exactly on the status on anything
- do not seem to co-ordinate well with other people in their own company.
- are never sure what forms you have already filled out

I have found the staff in the banks are not well trained up, one person tells you one thing and another tells you something different. In the last couple of years I have found this rather than 10 years ago.

Angela59

Hi Tim,

I feel your pain. We got approved for our mortgage over two months ago (for less than we originally wanted) and put down our booking deposit five weeks ago on the house we wanted to buy.

Now the bank has come back and wants to see all our bank statements and payslips for the last three months because the original six months-worth of statements and payslips we originally submitted, are "too old" and they want more up to date ones!!! I'm so annoyed just because every time they ask for something else, there's a delay and I really wish we could've been told two months ago when we got the original approval that extra paperwork would be needed. We could've had it all sorted and ready to give to them.

The latest is that they are querying my actual take home pay versus my yearly salary because I've been taking parental leave one day a week. Even though I was taking this parental leave back when they gave us the approval and you can see this on the payslips I submitted, plus it's completely voluntary and at MY request - not my employer. In fact, my employer could refuse to let me continie taking it, at any time! Why do they give you approval and then make you jump through all the hoops again????

I'm really afraid now that they won't actually give us this mortgage and I will be so upset and angry if this is the case.

Does this happen to everyone??

I have been trying to get AIB mortgage online lending dept to call me back for 3 days now. Each time I ring the Go-Between Dept tells me someone will call me back later. Nothing happens. They told me today they are out the door with mortgage applications, that's why no one has got back to me yet. They said they would try to prioritise me so that someone would ring me back today (as opposed to not at all I guess...) I wonder how many applications are actually going through. I had approval and it lapsed only a couple of weeks ago. You'd wonder is it genuine busyness or stalling tactics as they can only lend out so much at a time or something.
I wonder if it would be easier to go through my local AIB branch instead, or do brokers get preferential treatment in the queues?

Found out in the meantime they had my contact details wrong so couldn't call me back! So maybe quite not as busy as I thought...And they are actually very polite, patient and helpful when you do get through.

I find a lot of the front line staff are actually trying their best under difficult circumstances; it's clear that the problem lies much further up the chain. Should have all been let fail.