Standard Life to Barclays - breaking contract?

lornaprice

paulo12 wrote: »

Anyone else had a phone call ?

From whom? We've had one from Standard Life.

937carrera

Yes, some signs of contrition, but maybe too late

paulo12

lornaprice wrote: »

From whom? We've had one from Standard Life.

Well, yeah - I wasn't wondering if anyone's favourite aunt had called recently I was offered some kind of "compromise", but it isn't really and to get it I have to sign a contract that contains a clause to say that they can remove it again whenever they like for just about any reason they like. Just wondered if it was just me because I'm the one who took it to The Times, or whether they were offering the same deal to everyone. If they're offering it to all it would suggest to me that they realise that they are going to have problem enforcing this. The main thing here is that the "reason" they have given for removing the drawdown feature is that their IT can't do it, yet it seems that it can when they want it to ?

paulo12

937carrera wrote: »

Yes, some signs of contrition, but maybe too late

Too late because you've moved on to the new mystery mortgage that you don't want to tell us about or too late because you intend to carry on challenging their authority to make the changes ?

NoLongerFreestyle

Hi, I think there is potentially another problem with the Terms and Conditions of this mortgage.
The leaflet that I got in March was very shifty on the overpayments issue, and when the overpayments get subtracted from the balance. If I remember correctly, it said that the balance was adjusted on 1st of April. I rang the helpline and spoke to a rep; pressed him on the issue. All he could say is that the interest would be calculated 'correctly'. But he could not give me a clear answer on what amount it would be calculated.
So say, if my mortgage was £100k and I made an overpayment of £10k on the 2nd of April, would I pay interest on £100k or £90k until the 1 April the next year? Seems like a simple question, but no simple answer is forthcoming.
I am sooo glad that I am not the only furious one.

lornaprice

Standard Life have made us a new offer. On transfer to Barclays they have offered to increase the amount we can drawdown from 20,000 (which was the original figure) to 75,000. But this is still significantly less than we had with SL.

The new offer also seems to suggest that we can overpay as much as we like or pay it off, whereas the original Barclays offer only allowed us to overpay 10% of the outstanding balance.

A significant shift, and one which, strangely, now seems to be achievable on their IT systems.

We haven't accepted this offer.

The Financial Ombudsman Service seems to be dragging its feet.

paulo12

lornaprice wrote: »

Standard Life have made us a new offer. On transfer to Barclays they have offered to increase the amount we can drawdown from 20,000 (which was the original figure) to 75,000. But this is still significantly less than we had with SL.

The new offer also seems to suggest that we can overpay as much as we like or pay it off, whereas the original Barclays offer only allowed us to overpay 10% of the outstanding balance.

A significant shift, and one which, strangely, now seems to be achievable on their IT systems.

We haven't accepted this offer.

The Financial Ombudsman Service seems to be dragging its feet.

That's interesting. Mine was £72k but they told me it wasn't possible to go to that kind of figure any more. Nothing to do with LTV either as even my 72k max would only be around 20%.

Read the T&C's very carefully before you even consider accepting this as they contain a clause giving them the right to remove it at any time they see fit.

Also, the drawdown part of the loan is a tracker @4.49% over BoE base rate, not your usual rate. Doesn't sound too bad while that equates to 4.99% but when rates go back up to more normal levels that will be very expensive.

lornaprice

paulo12 wrote: »

That's interesting. Mine was £72k but they told me it wasn't possible to go to that kind of figure any more. Nothing to do with LTV either as even my 72k max would only be around 20%.

Read the T&C's very carefully before you even consider accepting this as they contain a clause giving them the right to remove it at any time they see fit.

Also, the drawdown part of the loan is a tracker @4.49% over BoE base rate, not your usual rate. Doesn't sound too bad while that equates to 4.99% but when rates go back up to more normal levels that will be very expensive.

Thanks, we had spotted the rate.

I also don't see the point of signing a contract which they can withdraw at whim, this is precisely what we're arguing about in the first place.

It is not entirely clear to me exactly what they are offering. I am going to phone them up next week to try to clarify matters.

paulo12

lornaprice wrote: »

Thanks, we had spotted the rate.

I also don't see the point of signing a contract which they can withdraw at whim, this is precisely what we're arguing about in the first place.

It is not entirely clear to me exactly what they are offering. I am going to phone them up next week to try to clarify matters.

Well, good luck with that. I've never yet managed to get anyone to actually be clear about anything.

lornaprice

Phoned telephone number provided. Woman on end of phone knows nothing about it and can't help me. Customer relations are phoning back tomorrow (alledgedly).

Not impressed.