Should Banks Be Forced to Include their SVR in Adverts?

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Some of the advertisements for mortgages, especially outside branches, at the moment, annoy me.

AIB advertise their opening hours as their selling point. "We are open at lunch, mornings, evenings". It scares me that some people would see this is a reason to open a mortgage with AIB rather than focusing on the rate offered.

EBS have a similar approach. EBS advertise their opening hours rather than rates.

BoI advertise special one-off offers to entice you in.

Some, but not all, Ulster Bank adverts, fail to mention their rates.

In the UK, nearly all adverts focus on rates. It is the same, rate focus adverts, from what I have seen, in some Eurozone countries.

The advertisements being run by the Irish banks seem to be moving peoples attention away from rates and towards other largely irrelevant factors.

Should banks be forced to state their SVR, for new and existing customers, in clear big text in all mortgage advertisements?

Would this help focus attend back on rates?

Just a thought.
 
I called in to an AIB branch recently looking for an appointment to meet the mortgage advisor to discuss my current rate etc. I was told they don't do appointments between 12-2pm. Not very convenient when you work 9-5 and get your lunch from 1-2.

So they may be "open" at lunch time, but not for speaking to you about your mortgage.
 
CiaranT said:
Should banks be forced to state their SVR, for new and existing customers, in clear big text in all mortgage advertisements?
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But banks offer much more than mortgages. They offer deposits. They offer current accounts. They offer term loans. They offer investment products. They couldn't put them all in the ad.



CiaranT said:
It scares me that some people would see this is a reason to open a mortgage with AIB rather than focusing on the rate offered.
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I suspect that the opening hours don't matter much to mortgage holders. I would say that in 25 years of mortgages, I have met the bank/building society on, at most, three occasions.

But your point is valid. With online banking and holes in the walls, does it matter what the bank opening hours are? Especially if they don't do meetings during lunch hour.

People's concerns are very odd indeed. Some customers, aided and abetted by journalists, obsess about bank charges and move their account and mortgage to save €80 a year. But they don't realise that they are paying thousands of euro a year extra for their mortgage.

Brendan
 
Brendan Burgess said:
But banks offer much more than mortgages. They offer deposits. They offer current accounts. They offer term loans. They offer investment products. They couldn't put them all in the ad.
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Absolutely. I am referring to mortgage advertisements only. I am suggesting that mortgage advertisements should contain the SVR as a mandatory requirement.

The open hours in AIB and EBS adverts are for mortgage meetings only.
 
Brendan Burgess said:
how could you put in their whole table of rates
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One makes it mandatory for all mortgage adverts to display just one rate, the "typical APR". A typical APR is the APR on the most popular / sold mortgage product by the bank. The small print of the advert must simply state that the APR varies depending on the product chosen.

The font size of the typical APR needs to be equating to the largest text in the advert.
 
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