End of loan admin fee - Advice wanted

mad7hatter

Hi All,

My partner has a car loan ending very soon. Looking through the paperwork I noticed the last payment included an admin fee. The normal monthly payments are £96.45 and the admin fee is £275, making the final payment a whopping £371.45. We wrote saying that we couldnt afford that amount and offered to pay the admin fee over 3 payments of £92(ish). We never heard anything back so my partner phoned Santander and asked for advice. The lady was quite rude and insinuated that we didnt send any letter. She then advised us to cancel the direct debit and pay what we could by card. The outstaning balance would then be passed to their collections department where we could set up a payment plan. When asked that surely this would affect my partners credit rating, the adviser said yes but thats all she could suggest.

Does anyone have any sensible advice or suggestions about resolving this please ?

Regards,
Dave

suehippo

We were recently told that if you settle the balance over 31 days before the final payment is due (i.e not within the last month) then you don't have to pay this fee. You will need to get a settlement figure from Santander to confirm this. This is all OK assuming you aren't in your final month.

Apples2

mad7hatter wrote: »

When asked that surely this would affect my partners credit rating, the adviser said yes but thats all she could suggest.

That's correct, you will be defaulting on your final payment.

Your credit rating would have been affected even if they had agreed to your payment plan in advance.
It would be very unusual for a lender to agree a payment plan before the borrower starts missing payments.

To be fair you must have had this agreement for years now so it shouldn't really be coming as a surprise.

SarahAnne1311

Hi Mad7hatter,
Hope you dont mind me asking, did you resolve the admin charges saga?
My partner is currently going through the same thing and Santander are not willing to help. With regards to defaulting the final payment if paid more than a month in advance, Santander have told me this in incorrect and countless of when it is paid, the admin charges of £300 in this case still have to be paid no matter what. My partner took out the finance agreement when it was GE Money, does that make a difference?
Can you or anyone else help or give me some advice of what to do next? We are having a copy of the agreement sent to us to go over but other than that Santander cannot help!

Thank you all in advance!!

chanz4

every hp has a final charge similar to this amount, and it is in the agreement you signed