Mortgage company late fees etc

Donnyboy_2

We are probably about to see an increase in late and referred payment fees from Mortgage lenders as people lose income and their monthly Direct Debits bounce. Lenders charge fees just as high as banks when a monthly payment is late, and if they try to re-submit a DD that bounced earlier they may charge again for that. Does this comes under the same category as unfair bank charges?

borgbaiter

hi

yes and no. in principle it is the same but mortgage contracts are more tricky. most contain a clause entitleing them to reclaim legal costs. this means if you take them to court they can reclaim their costs from you win of lose. if you take them to the FOS this is not a problem so adapt the normal letters and threaten with the FOS rather than court.


Borgbaiter

dunstonh

In addition to the above, mortage fees tend to be packaged differently to overdraft fees in that they are not penalty fees but admin fees. This is another reason why there is so little success on this front. There is a thread in the mortgage section with people that have tried it and very few indications of success but lots of failures and some with costs having to be paid.