Claim re: Interest only mortgage

mushy23

I received an email from Mortgage.claims about claiming if you had an interest only mortgage from 2004. Is this possible? Would i just contact the lender?

[Deleted User]

Why do you think there is something for you to claim?

mushy23

The e-mail stated that i could be entitled to a refund for miscalculated payments from Northern Rock.

[Deleted User]

If you believe they've made an error (which is very unlikely), then write directly to them to let them know of the mistake.

Just don't use any claims company.

tacpot12

Why not just write to NR and ask them are they aware of any potential for miscalculated payments with the product you had? And if so, will they please check to see if there was any miscalculation on your account?

No need to speak to a random company that has sent you an email. In fact, I would go so far as to say that it would be foolish to speak to them or even acknowledge you had received the email. Your spam folder is the place for this email.

dunstonh

I received an email from Mortgage.claims about claiming if you had an interest only mortgage from 2004. Is this possible? Would i just contact the lender?

This is a strange area as most interest only complaints fail. Yet you are now seeing adverts for it. However, the adverts themselves are not claiming success. When they give numbers, they are not succesful complaint but people that have tried or are trying.

Companies can actually make money by just getting you to make a complaint even if the complaint is unsuccessful. a) Because they also use crowdfunding for investors and make money there or b) they package the complaints to be bought on bulk by a solicitor. In both cases, the crowdfunder and solicitors tend to lose money. With most solicitors wise to it, crowdfunding can conning naive investors has taken over.

jamesd

mushy23 wrote: »

The e-mail stated that i could be entitled to a refund for miscalculated payments from Northern Rock.

That's not completely bogus because there was one case where NR redress was due. There was another possible case as well but that was rejected.

But you're probably suffering from an attempted advance fee fraud arguing "what if NR miscalculated your monthly payments" without any reason to think that they ever did. This sort of scam relies on getting you to pay money for something but dunstonh gave other ways they can make money.

Ignore it.

Pearls66

There is a company advertising on TV mortageclaims.com has anyone dealt wth this company successfully

SonOf

Pearls66 wrote: »

There is a company advertising on TV mortageclaims.com has anyone dealt wth this company successfully

The volume of successful complaints overall is tiny. Single-digit figures. With a number of these CMCs, they package potential complaints to sell on or they crowfund investors promising them a cut of the returns (which will likely end up not happening and investors will lose money whilst the CMC continues to draw against it). For that, the CMCs need as many people to sign up as possible irrespective of whether they have a case or not.

The FSCS has been critical of claims companies putting in bogus complaints and the uphold rate has fallen from a very low figure already to a much lower one still.

https://www.mortgagestrategy.co.uk/fscs-sees-rise-in-spurious-mis-selling-claims-against-brokers/

The only real areas of concern over mortgages is poor quality debt consolidation or the use of sub-prime mortgages when the person could have had a prime mortgage. Debt consolidation is not a bad thing but there have been cases where things have been included that should have been left out (such as when the debt was due to be repaid in the next 24 months and was affordable). Interest-only mortgages are not an area of widespread concern and usually fail as the increase in house price is taken into account and that leaves the person better off.

Indeed, on a FOS complaint that they upheld, they said the person had to sell their house in the next 12 months at market price and only if it sold for less than it was bought for would the broker be required to pay redress. If they chose not to sell, there was no redress.

The FOS and the FSCS are wise to the spurious claims being generated by these CMCs.

The_squirrell

These companies are basically fishing to try and find anything that they may be able to use in future to make claims. As SonOF has said above, successful complaints are extremely rare, and if you feel that there has been any issues, then always complain directly as the fees charged by companies such as these will be massive. If you fancy a challenge by the way, try and work out what the fees are and how they will be funded from their website!!


All these companies do, is submit a Subject Access Request. They then have access to every bit of personal information that is contained in your mortgage file. Good luck to anyone who is happy with this.