Early Redemption charge

zentay

I am going to complain about the following, any thoughts.

I signed up with A&L for a 2 year tied mortgage just over a year ago through the mortgage brokers London & Country. a year into the deal I decided to move house. we went through L&C again and they advised that we "port" our current mortgage and extend it to what we need for the new house with A&L.
I started the ball rolling on the application in November 2006 moving into the house Feb 2007. everything was was fine except that A&L decided the week before we moved not to loan us the money. (which is their perfect right to do)
L&C were great arranging a new self cert mortgage in less than a week. but A&L charged us £2.6K for coming out of the tied mortgage that I had no intention of coming out off.
Do you think I have a valid complaint? considering A&L left me in the lurch?

any comments and complaint angles would be much appreciated.
Thanks

danjberry

what was their reason for declining you?

zentay

I'm self employed, they would not accept my accounts as they were not signed by a Chartered Accountant. (but these same accounts are what officailly go to Companies house) with the accounts ignored our tax return figures were too low.

toonfish

why didn't you get an accountant to check and sign them, or simply provide your inland revenue tax assessment?

danjberry

zentay wrote:

I'm self employed, they would not accept my accounts as they were not signed by a Chartered Accountant. (but these same accounts are what officailly go to Companies house) with the accounts ignored our tax return figures were too low.

how long did they have the accounts for before deciding to decline you? if they had them right at the start and dragged their heals for months before deciding they could not use them you may be entitled to complaining. if it was you who dragged your heals and took you ages to provide the accounts then i cannot see any point in complaining. also if you stated a different figure of your earnings then what the accounts showed then i would also think there is no point in complaining.

hope this helps

MarkyMarkD

The basic answer is that you have no case to complain. Porting is a privilege, not a right, and with any lender if they don't want to lend you the money on the new property, they won't let you port the mortgage, and you'll have to pay the penalty.

As I've posted before (many times, now) otherwise everyone who wanted to avoid paying an ERC would apply for a new loan, fail to provide their accounts or payslips or whatever, get declined and say "OK, I don't have to pay the ERC as you declined my port application".

It is very unusual for you to have been declined one week before moving. You'd normally have an offer ages before completion and that would be binding on the lender, barring any serious changes in circumstances.

You stated in the original post that you needed more money for the new house; it's either down to you needing too high an amount compared to your income or due to the non-certified accounts. As others have posted, why didn't you just get the income certified which would have saved you the £2,600 for a few £100 in accoutancy fees?

brasso

Maybe the accounts were made up, and this is why an accountant wouldn't sign them?

Just a thought.

MarkyMarkD

LOL, brasso. What a cynical suggestion!

zentay

Sorry folks I've not logged into this thread for a few days.

My advisor was in discussion with my accountant. when my accounts were not accepted due to not being signed by a Chartered surveyer. (they dont need to be signed by a chartered surveyer in order to lodge them with companies house.)
no one made the suggestion to get a chartered surveyer to sign the accounts and to be honest I never thought of it either.I wonder if this would have been acceptable to the lender?
I then had to get my Tax return completed ASAP as I have said above and it was the tax return figures that the lender refused the loan on.

danjberry

if your tax return figures were what your accounts stated i would complain as they had the information from the start.

MarkyMarkD

Your mortgage advisor should have known what information A&L would need to support your application. I don't understand why:

(1) your advisor needed to talk to your accountant; or
(2) your accounts needed to be signed by a chartered surveyor - I presume you mean chartered accountant???

All your advisor needed to do was correctly advise you, up front, of the information requirements A&L would have for a self-employed individual. Or if he didn't know, he should have asked and then communicated it to you.

What does he think he earns his fees for?