Nationwide "ported" Mortgage - drawdown facility removed without warning!

drofluf62

I have no interest in ranting about anything or hearing anyone else do so and hope my post was a sensible, factual one. But perhaps we have all become too inured to bad behaviour? That was my point!

Also, we are of course in a really quite serious situation now not of our making. And are somewhat worried about it, as I'm sure you will understand. We don't borrow money save for the mortage and never have. And this will probably force us to have to do so at rates which we would never have considered.

The small print which others seem to believe will be there if we look is not.

opinions4u

I find it somewhat bleak that none of you who have kindly answered seem to see anything wrong in a High Street Lender lying to a customer and stuffing their financial planning to this degree

It doesn't matter who thinks it's wrong or right. What matters is if it is right or wrong.

Nobody lied. Lying implies a deliberate attempt to mislead and I'd be confident that it isn't deliberate. I do accept that they may have provided inaccurate information.

Your problem now is proving it in a complaint to Nationwide that will almost certainly have to be escalated to the FOS. My guess is that the FOS, in the absence of proof of a conversation taking place, will say the written T&Cs of your new mortgage are what matters. Do they guarantee drawdown?

I think you're stumped.

Thrugelmir

drofluf62 wrote: »

But remember, we asked the question about the drawdown and it was answered in the affirmative.

Is the drawdown facility clearly stiplulated in the offer letter you signed or the new contract?

No substance legally in a verbal recollection. As obviously 2 sides to the story.

If as was said earlier by Kingstreet that NW withdrew the facility in 2010. Then there's no ambiguity on the behalf of the NW as its a clear policy.

My personal views of the NW and what they have done is not relevant, and wouldn't add anything to the debate. On commercial grounds NW's stance is fully understandable. At a 2.5% mortgage rate your existing product is losing them money. So as a mutual lender someone else is in effect subsidising you.

kingstreet

I've thought further about this.

The (lack of) ability to drawdown is irrelevant, if the overpayments weren't redrawn before the port.

As the OP intimated and I agreed in posts #3 & #4 you could have the facility to re-draw, but if the OP has not made any overpayments to the current mortgage, there is nothing to redraw.

The problem is earlier in the process, IMHO, before the existing mortgage was repaid.

Here's my take on this. Figures are purely illustrative;-

Example 1

Mortgage balance £150,000
Overpayments £100,000

Residual balance £50,000 repaid at completion.

At sale of property, current mortgage repaid and rate ported to new mortgage. Port restricted to remaining £50,000 and any increased borrowing allowed on new product and new terms.

or

Example 2

Mortgage balance £150,000
Overpayments £100,000

Residual balance £50,000
Prior to completion, overpayments £100,000 redrawn

Balance repaid at completion £150,000.

At sale of property, current mortgage repaid and rate ported to new mortgage. Port applied to outstanding £150,000 and any increased borrowing allowed on new product and new terms.

Last issue. Did the OP seek advice from Nationwide, or simply arrange "execution-only" by telling Nationwide what they wanted? There is a very fine line between advice and information and lenders toe that line very carefully. Brokers normally only provide advice, so we're held to account for everything (and rightly so) and we document what we say accordingly.

Thrugelmir

kingstreet wrote: »

I've thought further about this.

The (lack of) ability to drawdown is irrelevant, if the overpayments weren't redrawn before the port.

Good shout for a Friday afternoon. Obvious really.

kingstreet

It's amazing the clarity of thought one achieves after a couple of drinks...

But, it left me not completing the point. That extra £100k should then be paid off the new mortgage, creating the overpayment reserve which could now be redrawn...!

drofluf62

...actually have one beside me as I write - not sure how many more bottles I'll be able to afford after all!

Thanks for your time and thought. I shall go and show these to my partner.

It's obvious you know your stuff, and I can see your arguments are very strong. I just feel we were, well, totally misled. We could obviously have drawn down just before rearranging the mortgage and none of this would have happened. And it's what should have been made clear at the time, bearing in mind that we need to do work on the house we have bought.

But thanks. Clearly the financial services sector will imagine it's we who lie about what happened in that room but we know the truth.

Nice bottles of red all round .... but I'm very depressed by it all.

kingstreet

FWIW, it appears to be a lottery what "help" (notice I refrain from using the word advice) you receive from a lender.

One employee can tell you how best to take advantage of his/her employer's systems and procedures, while another will say nothing, believing acting in the employer's interests is somehow meeting their employer's requirements...

From April next year, all mortgages will be "advised", so lenders' staff can't use the "advice" and "information" confusion to the advantage of their employer.

This is music to your average broker's ears, as we've put up with this for the last nine years of mortgage regulation and before that during self-regulation.

Whatever term is used to describe it;-

- you could have been "informed" that redrawing the overpayments before completion was a good idea

- you could have been informed of the removal of redraw ability post March 2010

and you can argue to FOS that had you been correctly informed, the decisions you would have made would have been different.

Your lender is/was expected to adhere to FSA "Treating Customers Fairly" outcomes;-

Outcome 1: Consumers can be confident that they are dealing with firms where the fair treatment of customers is central to the corporate culture.

Outcome 3: Consumers are provided with clear information and are kept appropriately informed before, during and after the point of sale.

Outcome 5: Consumers are provided with products that perform as firms have led them to expect, and the associated service is of an acceptable standard and as they have been led to expect.

Outcome 6: Consumers do not face unreasonable post-sale barriers imposed by firms to change product, switch provider, submit a claim or make a complaint.

http://www.fsa.gov.uk/doing/regulated/tcf

HAMISH_MCTAVISH

kingstreet wrote: »

you can argue to FOS that had you been correctly informed, the decisions you would have made would have been different.

Your lender is/was expected to adhere to FSA "Treating Customers Fairly" outcomes

This...

The OP has clearly been misled.

Whether down to deliberate intent or incompetence is of no relevance.

Complain and escalate as high as you can.

drofluf62

Appreciate your thought and time spent on this.

Even had it seemed we had NO case we would have taken the complaint as far as we could as it just isn't right that it happened.

But the final comments give us something more to work on than we had.

Letter is already with the lender and then I expect we will need to take it further after that.

Meanwhile having to try and rearrange all our arrangements financial, which isn't fun.