Help - 3 weeks and counting waiting for Nationwide Decision in Principle

bobadoba

Hi,

This is my first ever post on MSE but I've always found advice offered to others' posts very useful and am hoping someone might be able to share some wisdom with me on my situation.

My partner and I are Nationwide mortgage customers, having bought our first property with them in July 2013 on a 4 year fixed "Flexclusive" deal. We got this as we have a joint FlexAccount with Nationwide, and I also have a sole FlexAccount, an e-savings account and an ISA with Nationwide.

We spoke with Nationwide a month or so ago about the idea of porting our current mortgage with them and borrowing more, so that we could move from a flat to a house to take advantage of the rising value of the area in which we live. They said that our mortgage was portable, and suggested that we get our property under offer so that we knew what figures we were looking at for our Decision in Principle and subsequent full application.

We received and accepted an offer fairly quickly and phoned Nationwide to move forward with a Decision in Principle. This, however, was referred to the underwriters. Having checked our Experian & Equifax credit reports we could see that we are not currently registered on the electoral roll at this address - or at least that's how it looked. Having spoken to the council they have confirmed that we have been on the local electoral roll since we moved in, but our flat's address is listed slightly differently to that on our credit report so it is not showing up. All other areas of our credit reports were fine with no defaults, debts etc. We overpay on our mortgage by the max amount each month and haven't missed a payment.

We were asked by Nationwide to send in 3 months of bank statements and our most recent payslip. We forwarded on the email from the council re the electoral roll for good measure.

It has now been 3 weeks since our decision was referred and every time we phone Nationwide to chase our decision (pretty much every day) they say either that figures were incorrectly entered and have had to be adjusted, or that they have a backlog and things are taking ages, or that we can expect an answer within 48 hours (god knows how many times I've heard that one now).

I just wondered if anyone else had been in a similar situation and if there was something specific or someone in particular you would recommend speaking to in order to move things along? I just want to know either way if we have a chance of getting the mortgage - knowing full well that a DIP doesn't mean an acceptance at full application stage - so that we can move forward or forget all about it and let our buyers know the deal's off.

FYI we are looking at LTV 66% and Nationwide have already confirmed that affordability is OK.

Thanks for any advice you can give and apologies for the long post.

amnblog

This is ridiculous - a broker could have dealt with this within a week (even allowing for the fact that sometimes Nationwide can be very slow on referred cases).


Your options are:


1. Continue with this fiasco
2. Appoint a broker to assist you

kingstreet

Nationwide and its annoying Experian address targeting issues once again. When are they going to sort this out?

Whenever I get a new case and the applicants live in a flat, I have to go through the rigmarole of ringing up the technical helpline while we try all the possible variations of flat number, building name/number and street name.

Then, when it doesn't work and it comes back as a refer, it's a paper application and the inevitable delay that causes.

Nationwide's one real let-down.

bobadoba

Thank you both very much - it's good to know I'm not just going mad. I contacted Nationwide on Twitter who have looked into the issue and said that we are looking at another 2-3 working days; I've replied to say that I have no confidence in that response given the number of times I've already heard it!

We didn't pursue the idea of getting help from a mortgage broker as we assumed it wouldn't be appropriate in our case, e.g. porting an existing mortgage and staying with the same lender. Is that not true and would it be worth us considering asking a broker to help us?

amnblog

Yes, you can use a mortgage broker to port your existing case.

bobadoba

OK many thanks - will have a think about that as might help with the stress levels!

Madbags

Make a complaint.


We had lots of issues with our online application with Nationwide initially. The way they deal with documents when you send them in is completely useless. They have a different member of staff for each different type of paperwork they receive, usually meaning one will pick up what they need from the pack and then just leave the rest lying around or claim the rest hasn't been received due to it all being together and at the very end of it all it had a technical fault after paying the valuation fee.


Eventually we made a complaint as we literally waited 2 weeks after a DIP got referred thinking everything was being taken care of when it wasn't. The lady who took ownership of the complaint the day after we made it was very helpful, useful and sped things up to the way they should have been. She stayed with us and dealt with everything until the very end when we got our formal mortgage offer. She also sent us £75 in compensation, which in the scheme of things isn't much but it's better than nothing.


We didn't use a broker, we did it all ourselves. We knew exactly what we wanted and went for it so advice wasn't needed, 'nor was it relevant to pay someone money for something we can do for free. In hindsight, I'm still happy with that decision. If Nationwide just did their job properly then we wouldn't have had any issues, broker or not.


My only recommendation is not to use the online application and make a telephone or face to face appointment. We did ours on the phone in the end after cancelling 2 previous applications and it all went through fine, didn't even get referred on the DIP.

amnblog

If you had used a broker the paperwork would not have been lost in the first place as we upload it safe and secure online.

bobadoba

Thanks - we did actually do the DIP over the phone rather than online; I'm not sure if it makes much of a difference as it all goes into the same computer system (or that's what I thought).

We were told by the person on the phone who received the refer decision that if we could submit all documents to our local branch within 24 hours we would be looking at a decision within 48 hours. Not having a Nationwide branch particularly locally, my partner made quite a trip on public transport in able to meet this deadline, an hour or so before he was due at the hospital for a major operation. It all adds to the annoyance of being kept waiting so far beyond that initial 48 hour promise. I've now been told that we'll definitely hear by end of play on Thursday 4th Nov - 3.5 weeks after the initial application - but I still am very wary.

I think I will make a complaint, that's a good idea. I'm slightly loathe to as I do like Nationwide in general but this DIP referral system seems archaic!

amnblog

It sounds worse with every post.

bobadoba

I know. It would almost be funny if it wasn't happening to us!