The (sh)abbey - are they trying to avoid lending?

mirandabakes

Without going into loooooong details, we have been trying to complete our mortgage with the Abbey for several weeks now. It was originally "fast-tracked" and approved subject to valuation, but has been dragging on, and on, and on with new little pieces of information being required all the time (they must have called us 4 times to get our credit card number for the valuation). Do they really intend to lend us the money or do they just lead people on to meet some kind of quota and then miraculously change their minds?

_Andy_

There would be no commercial point in 'leading people on'. Probably just busy /being inefficient.

SarBear1980

This doesn't fill me with confidence as I sent my application back last week. Are Abbey really that bad??

koexelek

mirandabakes wrote: »

It was originally "fast-tracked" and approved subject to valuation, but has been dragging on, and on, and on with new little pieces of information being required all the time (they must have called us 4 times to get our credit card number for the valuation).

This is known in the trade as " stalling"

A lender does this when they are ridiculously understaffed and can't cope with their workload.
By shifting the emphasis back to the borrower, asking you to provide things they probably don't even need, they just buy themselves time.

Dan_1976

Abbey are good at both stalling and being understaffed!

talkalot

Shabby are a awful mortgage lender/bank. Tried to get a mortgage with them last year. They told us that we needed to build up some form of banking relationship with them. We opened a new account with them and transfered all our wages over to them. They told us to wait 6 months to see how we ran our account. After 6 months they gave us a overdraft and upgraded our debit cards. We then tried for a mortgage with them again only to be told we dont give mortgages to anyone with a poor credit history anymore. When asked how long before they would have a look they said they just would not give a mortgage unless you were completely clean. Now bank with HSBC.

simon_templar_2

Dreadful service on the mortgage side, keep you waiting for weeks and weeks. They promise to do things and nothing happens. Full of empty words and no action. Dont even think about it.

mirandabakes

hmmm, so on the plus side it should come through in the long run?!

thepeachyone

mirandabakes wrote: »

Without going into loooooong details, we have been trying to complete our mortgage with the Abbey for several weeks now. It was originally "fast-tracked" and approved subject to valuation, but has been dragging on, and on, and on with new little pieces of information being required all the time (they must have called us 4 times to get our credit card number for the valuation). Do they really intend to lend us the money or do they just lead people on to meet some kind of quota and then miraculously change their minds?

We have been having the same problems with the Co-op Bank and I did wonder if it was some sort of technique for stalling. Like you we were approved subject to valuation, then all sorts of new little pieces of info were required, separately requested of course, one following the other.

Ours has taken so long, it is having to be re-keyed (i.e. the broker has to put all our details in again as its gone past 90 days :eek:). We originally applied in late February. We have already had a valuation because at one point we were told they had everything they needed so we rushed to get the valuation done before going on holiday. Once the valuation was in they asked for a further letter from husbands employer to clarify something regarding his contract. Now theyve decided they dont want that.

I would like to put a complaint in when I eventually get a mortgage, but Im not sure who to do it with. I asked several times to speak to the manager but never got them.

Hippychick

We have had our mortgage approved with abbey and not had any problems yet. Our survey is being carried out tomorrow and we have been told that our offer will be issued once the survey has been done.

We did have to give our card details a second time for the survey fee but was told if they don't take the payment within 3 days the card details disappear off their system, and they only take payment when the mortgage is being transferred to the mortgage centre and the survey needs to be instructed.

jill2002

Why are you paying for a valuation? The deals at the moment are the same rate, but have a free valuation and £250 cashback for legals !! Same rate, same set up fee.