The Financial Services Authority has been heavily criticised by a committee of MPs for falling to protect thousands of Bank of Ireland customers who face their mortgage repayments doubling or even tripling in two months’ time. The City watchdog was told yesterday by the Treasury Select Committee, it must do more to ensure that customers of the bank were being treated fairly. Committee chairman Andrew Tyrie also criticised FSA managing director of the consumer and markets business unit, Martin Wheatley, for not providing enough information to demonstrate the regulator had thought carefully about the issue. Last month, the bank wrote to its 13,500 customers to inform them of the rate hike on their base rate tracker mortgages despite the fact that the Bank of England has held interest rates at a record 0.5 per cent for four years......Read more here
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Bank of Ireland UK customers could see mortgage costs triple - allaboutFORUMS
Thousands of unlucky landlords are bracing themselves for a 120 per cent increase in mortgage costs in a month as Bank of Ireland forces through a controversial rate rise – and the Financial Services Authority says it is unable to intervene. But other landlords are continuing to profit from a heady mix of low mortgage rates, high rental demand and stabilising property prices as the buy-to-let market – which Financial Mail is investigating in one of our biggest readership surveys undertaken – enjoys an astonishing resurgence. Bank of Ireland, which used to lend in Britain but now wants to pull out, sparked anger early this month when it said 13,500 customers on tracker rates – which most people understand as rising and falling in line with the Bank of England base rate – would have to pay more. In some cases, their interest rates would double, even though the base rate has been unchanged since March 2009.....Read more here