Mortgage Booking Fees

cddx77

My partner and I recently applied for a re-mortgage with The Abbey and utilised the services of a local Independent Financial Adviser. We selected the deal and decided that we did not want the £995 booking fee to be added to the mortgage and was informed that we had to pay this upfront by debit or credit card, and this we did.

The application went through to offer however due to issues with our existing lender we decided that we could not proceed with the application and advised our adviser accordingly to cancel the application.

We then expected that our £995 would be refunded and so did our adviser, however The Abbey have informed us that this fee will not be refunded, is this correct?? Surely we can not be charged such a high fee when we have not taken up the mortgage?

Our Adviser enquired on our behalf and was informed that this was most definatley the case, see the following content from their email to him .... "unfortunately the case was agreed with the client paying the booking fee upfront. This is non refundable and so the client will not get this returned"

Can anyone tell us how we can get this fee back or have we lost it for good

cbrpaul

Every booking fee i have ever seen is always "non refundable"

Once you have paid it the rate you got is secure , if you then decide to back out after agreeing to take their offer , then im afraid its your loss,

Im surprised your advisor even tried to get it back !!

dunstonh

We then expected that our £995 would be refunded and so did our adviser, however The Abbey have informed us that this fee will not be refunded, is this correct??

Its non refundable and one of the reasons why its worth adding it to the mortgage but then paying it off when the mortgage is completed.

Surely we can not be charged such a high fee when we have not taken up the mortgage?

You are booking the funds to be available. That either prevents someone else using that money or if you dont complete it potentially leaves the bank with the liability of having to cover the deal with the investors providing the funds (the financing of the deal).

Can anyone tell us how we can get this fee back or have we lost it for good

You would be relying on the good will of the lender. However, the adviser should also have been aware that the paperwork says non-refundable. I would suggest you look at the key features illustration and if it says non-refundable in there then there is little you can do. If there is no mention of non refundable then you have a good reason to put a complaint in against Abbey.

koexelek

dunstonh wrote: »

Its non refundable and one of the reasons why its worth adding it to the mortgage but then paying it off when the mortgage is completed.



.

I'd never let one of my customers pay a booking fee up front ( unless there was no choice) for that reason.

Always best to add it, then pay it off after the mortgage completes.

cddx77

Eureka !!!

Our IFA came up trumps and got the booking fee back. We understand that he got The Abbey to change and re issue the mortgage offer so that the fee is added to the mortgage, thus our upfront fee has been refunded. It is lucky we did not cancel the mortgage offer even though we now have no intention of proceeding with it. Again the advice of our IFA and Mr Lewis.

We understand that this is a common issue and cause for complaint with The Abbey and the basis of how this fee is dealt with is hidden well in the small print of the application. A learning curve all around to check the small print.

I note that the other contributers did not figure the way out of it, so my IFA has exonerated himself and learned a lesson about The Abbey along the way.

Alls well that ends well.