Help to Buy not answering phone

marmitesocks

catdad said:

I'm on hour three of calling today.

We got an email from our solicitors earlier this month that because of their rules around valuations we had to get a new or extended valuation. Target hadn't sent us anything, obviously. Our surveyors were absolutely great and did this for us free of charge, but took a couple of weeks so I had it on Friday. I emailed it to what I thought was the right address, the one that I'd been told to in the communication from the solicitor.

I spent two hours on the phone on Tuesday only to find out they'd changed their email address without informing anyone and without even an auto-reply put on directing to the new address. I sent the new valuation and got a callback Wednesday morning by a really lovely advisor who sent it while I was on the phone with him.

I've received it but my solicitor hasn't, he's spent hours on the phone yesterday and today, I've spent hours on the phone today. Our remortgage completion date is on Monday, all we're waiting for is this, and we're looking at the barrel of a variable rate there's no way we can afford to be on. This has been one of the most stressful experiences of my life, far worse than anything I had buying our first home, it's affecting the health and sleep of me and my partner now. This company is just incompetent and if there's any way to make complaints definitely let me know - I'll do every one!

As a starter try:

Homes England

enquiries@homesengland.gov.uk

My Help to Buy

complaints@myhelptobuyloan.co.uk

Equiniti Gateway Service

eqcs-complaints@equiniti.com

catdad

Thank you, I'll be trying the internal company ones tonight in the hope it might escalate things.

But they've probably got even fewer and more useless people on the complaint line than the regular one so 🙃

lauraamie

I'm in a similar position currently. between myself and my solicitor we managed to get through once last week, they promised on the friday they would send over the documents needed by close of play - obviously that never happened.

We are only waiting on this to be able to complete, I'm now in a variable rate for my mortgage - the payment comes out tomorrow which would have been avoided as we would have completed before then. On top of that my ex is now refusing to contribute to his side of the bills - it feels like it will never end!

marmitesocks

lauraamie said:

I'm in a similar position currently. between myself and my solicitor we managed to get through once last week, they promised on the friday they would send over the documents needed by close of play - obviously that never happened.

We are only waiting on this to be able to complete, I'm now in a variable rate for my mortgage - the payment comes out tomorrow which would have been avoided as we would have completed before then. On top of that my ex is now refusing to contribute to his side of the bills - it feels like it will never end!

I've nothing helpful to add. Just wanted to say Im so sorry, this sounds awful! 

marmitesocks

Property Ombudsman

I phoned the FCA and they were lovely but said that reporting to the Property Ombudsman would be more appropriate for this issue.

As I understand it you need to have logged a complaint directly with the company first, but once you have done you can raise it as a complaint with them also:

https://www.tpos.co.uk/consumers/how-to-make-a-complaint

I'm not sure which is true - whether it's the FCA or the Property Ombudsman, but thought I would share. 

Going to investigate further, but out of energy to fight this today. 

hannah11111

marmitesocks said:

Property Ombudsman

I phoned the FCA and they were lovely but said that reporting to the Property Ombudsman would be more appropriate for this issue.

As I understand it you need to have logged a complaint directly with the company first, but once you have done you can raise it as a complaint with them also:

I'm not sure which is true - whether it's the FCA or the Property Ombudsman, but thought I would share. 

Going to investigate further, but out of energy to fight this today. 

TPO are good but help to buy aren’t registered with them as they’re not providing a service that they normally
regulate. 

Everyone needs to contact their MP as others have done so they can all speak to the housing minister 

sunny_money

marmitesocks said:

sunny_money said:

Thanks @marmitesocks.

I finally got through yesterday evening. I asked what the problem was and it just seems like a massive lack of capacity rather than all staff except one were sick today for example. I asked if they could fix their phone system so it doesn’t hang up after 1 hr. Before I knew this was Lenvi I asked for clarity on whether I was speaking to Homes England or a company and they said Homes England, so they are concealing the truth because it is a reputation risk to Lenvi.

I have contacted some media about the situation and suggest everyone does the same to pressure Lenvi to improve. 

Hi @sunny_money, who did you contact in the media? Considering doing the same and would add weight if I followed up on ones you had contacted.

I didn’t put much thought into it tbh just contacted several of the major newspapers and an online FinTech site. I’m sure others can think of lots of better platforms, go for it everyone! 

sunny_money

marmitesocks said:

catdad said:

I'm on hour three of calling today.

We got an email from our solicitors earlier this month that because of their rules around valuations we had to get a new or extended valuation. Target hadn't sent us anything, obviously. Our surveyors were absolutely great and did this for us free of charge, but took a couple of weeks so I had it on Friday. I emailed it to what I thought was the right address, the one that I'd been told to in the communication from the solicitor.

I spent two hours on the phone on Tuesday only to find out they'd changed their email address without informing anyone and without even an auto-reply put on directing to the new address. I sent the new valuation and got a callback Wednesday morning by a really lovely advisor who sent it while I was on the phone with him.

I've received it but my solicitor hasn't, he's spent hours on the phone yesterday and today, I've spent hours on the phone today. Our remortgage completion date is on Monday, all we're waiting for is this, and we're looking at the barrel of a variable rate there's no way we can afford to be on. This has been one of the most stressful experiences of my life, far worse than anything I had buying our first home, it's affecting the health and sleep of me and my partner now. This company is just incompetent and if there's any way to make complaints definitely let me know - I'll do every one!

As a starter try:

Homes England

enquiries@homesengland.gov.uk

My Help to Buy

complaints@myhelptobuyloan.co.uk

Equiniti Gateway Service

eqcs-complaints@equiniti.com

I’m viewing the @helptobuy tweets but not a Twitter user. This would be a super useful post for everyone if it’s not already been done, can someone post it? :-) 

marmitesocks

sunny_money said:

marmitesocks said:

catdad said:

I'm on hour three of calling today.

We got an email from our solicitors earlier this month that because of their rules around valuations we had to get a new or extended valuation. Target hadn't sent us anything, obviously. Our surveyors were absolutely great and did this for us free of charge, but took a couple of weeks so I had it on Friday. I emailed it to what I thought was the right address, the one that I'd been told to in the communication from the solicitor.

I spent two hours on the phone on Tuesday only to find out they'd changed their email address without informing anyone and without even an auto-reply put on directing to the new address. I sent the new valuation and got a callback Wednesday morning by a really lovely advisor who sent it while I was on the phone with him.

I've received it but my solicitor hasn't, he's spent hours on the phone yesterday and today, I've spent hours on the phone today. Our remortgage completion date is on Monday, all we're waiting for is this, and we're looking at the barrel of a variable rate there's no way we can afford to be on. This has been one of the most stressful experiences of my life, far worse than anything I had buying our first home, it's affecting the health and sleep of me and my partner now. This company is just incompetent and if there's any way to make complaints definitely let me know - I'll do every one!

As a starter try:

Homes England

enquiries@homesengland.gov.uk

My Help to Buy

complaints@myhelptobuyloan.co.uk

Equiniti Gateway Service

eqcs-complaints@equiniti.com

I’m viewing the @helptobuy tweets but not a Twitter user. This would be a super useful post for everyone if it’s not already been done, can someone post it? :-) 

@sunny_money how do you mean?

It's a post by Help to Buy in which they set out their new contact details. About 50 people so far have replied to this tweet complaining and explaining the issues they are having. 

sunny_money

marmitesocks said:

Property Ombudsman

I phoned the FCA and they were lovely but said that reporting to the Property Ombudsman would be more appropriate for this issue.

As I understand it you need to have logged a complaint directly with the company first, but once you have done you can raise it as a complaint with them also:

https://www.tpos.co.uk/consumers/how-to-make-a-complaint

I'm not sure which is true - whether it's the FCA or the Property Ombudsman, but thought I would share. 

Going to investigate further, but out of energy to fight this today. 

Thanks @marmitesocks.

According to the Help to Buy complaints page the product is not FCA regulated, not sure if this applies to the administration of the product by a third party or not?

https://www.gov.uk/guidance/help-to-buy-complaints-procedure

Homes England as an entity and Help to Buy: Equity Loan as a product are exempt from the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) authorisation and regulation. But we believe in clear, fair and transparent handling of complaints that align with the industry standards.

So the Property Ombudsman is definitely worth a try!

@marmitesocks and everyone - let’s not forget to look after ourselves so we don’t burn out.