Inadequate advice from mortgage provider

BikingBud

Letter from mortgage provider advises we have 2 options when current deal finishes:

• Your mortgage deal ends on…..
• Choose a new deal now, before current deal ends
• Do nothing and pay FOR

In the 2 page letter there is no mention of being able to settle the mortgage without any ERC.

Is it just me or does this appear to be deliberately misleading?

Yes many on here will say that that is obvious but many are not as aware as MSE regulars and may end up paying more money than they need to - a typical ground for complaint.

Isthisforreal99

Just you...

And they don't give advice

dunstonh

As mentioned above, most mortgage lenders do not give advice. The end of a deal notification just lets you know what will happen next. It is not there to give advice.

So I'm afraid, yes, it's just you and it's not misleading. And there's no grounds for complaint because the mortgage terms are not just for the period of the short term special pricing but the whole term. None of those other parts are changing.

BikingBud

Note I used term advice not Advice.

But even then let's use the term inform, to get away from the precious protection of Advice.

Santander have not informed me of all the options that are available.

If they do not inform then how can their notification be considered appropriate.

After all people who entered into finance agreements without carrying out their own due diligence are now imposing a burden of ~£1billion because they were not informed of the options the agreement.

Please explain the difference.

MWT

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/82067179#Comment_82067179

They are very specifically informing you of the choices you have relating to the deal that is ending.

The choices you have under the general terms of the mortgage remain unchanged so there is nothing to inform you of in that regard.

ACG

Mortgage offer would have had the dates.

The redemption statement would have the dates.

If the customer called the bank to discuss, you would like to think they would mention it.

Appreciate what your saying and I suppose it would not take a lot to add that on. Maybe provide it as feedback.

BikingBud

I know the dates and the obligations.

My point is that this is not about me but that the lender should be advising (informing) their client of all available options. They did not advise (inform) that we could settle the mortgage without ERC.

To omit it is not a simple error. It is a deliberate action and therefore does not provide best information upon which said client can make an informed decision. There are now many instances where this type of omission has been determined to be a significant failure.

If well informed users of a consumer site feel it is OK then maybe it is just me, but I would suggest that the same users would prepare themselves for the event whereas many others might find it all confusing and misleading. Just look at a current thread about legacy Northern Rock mortgage. They, customers, blindly trust and rely implicitly upon what messages they get from the lender. If the lender only tells them half the story and the borrower ends up out of pocket whose fault is that?

The_Unready

"Note I used term advice not Advice."

What are you saying here? The word 'advice' has the same meaning whether or not it has a capital 'a'.

dunstonh

Note I used term advice not Advice.

Advice has a regulatory meaning in financial services. Whether it is capitalised or lowercase doesn't make any difference.

Santander have not informed me of all the options that are available.

Yes, they have. They are saying you can apply for a product transfer deal, or if you don't, it will revert to the terms you agreed when you took the mortgage out.

Any other option is irrelevant because it's already been given previously. This is specifically about a contract event that is happening that you agree to at the start of the mortgage or the last deal you applied for.

My point is that this is not about me but that the lender should be advising (informing) their client of all available options. They did not advise (inform) that we could settle the mortgage without ERC.

There is no duty or expectation that they need to repeat what you have already been told previously.

And if you want all available options, then you can have putting your head in an oven and dying and having life insurance to pay off the mortgage. Winning the lottery and using the money to pay off the mortgage. Inheritance from your great aunt dying and paying off the mortgage. Inheritance from your great uncle dying and paying off the mortgage and so on. How many millions of options do you want to cover seeing as you think all of them should be told to you?

To omit it is not a simple error. It is a deliberate action and therefore does not provide best information upon which said client can make an informed decision. 

There is no error. I think you're deliberately trolling us for a joke. You at least put a smiley in there to let us know you are pulling our legs.

BikingBud

I am trying to establish the clear difference between advising (used in formal contexts to mean notifying or informing someone of a fact) and providing advice (to offer recommendations, guidance, or an opinion to someone about what they should do).

Most regulars here might, will, see the differentiation but many others, not familiar with your assertion:

Advice has a regulatory meaning in financial services

will not.

I am saying they did not provide sufficient information. They deliberately withheld pertinent facts.

We can argue that advice (to offer recommendations, guidance, or an opinion to someone about what they should do) is regulated all day long but it doesn't vary the fact that there was a presentation of limited information due to mortgage provider decisions. The topic I was hoping to discuss here.

Your assertions:

Any other option is irrelevant because it's already been given previously.

There is no duty or expectation that they need to repeat what you have already been told previously.

Should then actually make the whole communication nugatory as everything is in the accepted mortgage offer, as it is with run on contracts for mobile phones etc. Those contracts that leave customers paying significantly more for the service after the cost of the phone has been recouped by the service provider.

And yes there are many ways in which the funds can be raised to settle the mortgage, but that is not the concern here. There is information that is required to inform a decision and the service provider has only provided some of that information. In the same manner, car finance providers did not provide financial advice, what would actually be best for the customers was to get a loan elsewhere, yet they failed to advise the customers of elements, costs, that remained hidden and were financially detrimental to those customers as higher interest rates were charged

There has been a significant judgment of liability for that failure.