Extended Mortgage term and Buildings Insurance Premiums.

[Roger]

AAD does like fighters!

[Guest]

Ok all been sent off this morning. Had issues with printer then scanner etc... But it was just as well, it gave me time to add the extra info in a coherent fashion and add to the case in a comprehensive and plainly understood manner. Obviously i have a lot more paperwork than i have been able to share here, i'll be very suprised if it actually gets to an ombudsman for a descsion and a published case. I think it will be sorted out "informally" . That said i'll keep you updated, if at any point i don't get back with an outcome then you'll be able to deduce whats happened. Wish me luck !!!

[Guest]

Hi again, just a random question not sure if its important or not. I've been able to log on and check my credit score since about 2010 with noddle/credit karma. I've just check now with experian and clearscore and my mortgage account does not show on any of them. Never has done on noddle even in 2010. Doesn't show in closed accounts either on any of them. Should i be concerned ?

[Guest]

Not looking good for me so far. Ombudsman reply:

What you're complaining about happened more than six years ago (the change to your mortgage in 1993). And, within the rules our service operates under, it sets out that where an event happened more than six years ago, we then need to think about when the complainant ought reasonably to have been aware of a cause for complaint. If that is more than three years before the complaint was raised, then we won't usually be able to investigate the complaint.



In your case, it does seem likely we won't be able to investigate the merits of your complaint. However, before I reach a finding on that I would like to request some more information from you. I will also be asking Santander to provide some additional information. Please provide the following:

I hope the extra information i provided qualifies me for this:




Fingers crossed.

[Guest]

Hi again, just thought i'd update. Bad news, good news and bad news, then bad news and good news or summat like that !!
Bad news, the FOS investigator said i ought reasonably to have known i had cause for complaint earlier than i did, I explained i contacted them from 1997 to 2002, but he said they where "queries" not complaints. Some other things too, so thats the short story. Good News, it can be referred to an actual Ombudsman for a final desision ,on wether to consider my complaint and thats before my complaint itself is considered etc.. Bad news,......... given that Santander have refused for it to be looked at due to "time limits" i think i'll have an uphill struggle. Also, from what i can fathom it may take three months from now before the Ombudsman makes his finding on wether he can investigate or not. Then longer again to look at it.......... So that where i am up to.

As this has dragged on for so long, i've been getting frustrated and researched like a demon. Take 'em to Court, what are my losses, what would be my cause of action ? What about the limitation periods they've mentioned.. etc....... all ran through my brain. Then the cost of a Court action............... Phew!!! I've researched FCA, MCOBS, BCOBS, DISP rules, etc. untill my head burst and i almost thought i was going nuts.

And then..................... GAME CHANGER !!! I'm not sure how i ever missed this, well i am actually , i'm not an expert at finances and the law, but its an absolute favourite here and its one of this forums specialities..................and its something my original paperwork shows, but i'd never paid it any attention: my "mortgage" is an actual "regulated credit agreement" under the CCA 1974.

In short.most mortgages are now "RMC"'s............. Regulated Mortgage Contracts. Mine is a "legacy CCA mortgage", as such all the provisions and protections of the act apply to me. Still do, the account is live.Mine was a small agreement for under £25k etc........... Now knowing that opens up a whole new ball game, but one that people on this site will be familiar with. So in short i've set off the standard CCA questions to my creditor, they're only really to cross the "i"'s and dot the "t"'s........... but other than that i'm good to go.

I'm not going to go into too much detail yet, but what i'm hoping will happen is i will give my creditor another chance personally to accept "mediation", then i'm ready to go.... N1 form for Court, application to make a Judgement under CCA, accept ruling from the Court to remedy as sees fit [no monetary value to the claim]. That should keep it simple and my cost liability down ?

Does anyone see a flaw in the plan or process? I don't want to go into too much detail at the minute unless some one has input and is interested.
Thanks for listening (or reading) :-)

[Guest]

Let me recap here........... i sent Santander a DSAR, it all came back. Letters from as early as 1988 etc...Just two things didn't come back and that was a mortgage microfiche from 1989 and same for 1990............ everything else i got, There are issues with microfiches from 1992/1992/1993 being obviously redacted or in plain speak had interest rates removed etc.. But on the whole i got everything. The DSAR team explained they may not keep microfiches that old etc... Earlier this month i put in a request for a duplicate statement from 1989 and 1990. I paid £10 for them. Today i got them. For me they show i made every payment i was expected to make. What they do not show is the "MAR" (as in all the micro fiches).........MAR is Monthly Arranged Payment. They also do not show my "arrears balance". They also show overpayments when the rate was as high as 15.4%. As evidenced by the 1991 statements showing a credit to the arrears balance. I rang them tonight just after 6pm, but even though their correspondance says they are open until 7pm the actual phone line says closed at 6pm. I put them on notice about just over a week ago, i told them what i had found wrong, i told them their self imposed time limits that mimic the Ombudsmans are pure fiction they have made up. I told them i have a live and active account and they need to account for it and this hiding behind some imaginary curtain was no good. And also has no basis in Law or any Code of Conduct at all. They have to account. They'll cease to have a duty to account six years after the expiration of my account. Wish me luck!!! I'm ringing them in the morning, first thing................

[Guest]

Just come off the fone, they will send out by post what my Monthly Payments for 89/90 where supposed to be. 7 to 10 working days. I also asked if they will give me the total amount paid under the agreement to date and the total amount of interest charged to date and i was told they can't do that don't have access etc.. and basically i would have to add it all up myself. I'll make the request formal by way of letter as that doesn't seem right to me? The problem with me adding it up myself is that is easy to do from the microfiche but that stopped around 2000 and the format in the years after that makes it very difficult to even understand a statement let alone collect figures from it. I must of paid some terrific amount by now, the interest charged and paid for 89/90 comes to £3711.96 i've paid another 30 years since then.

[Guest]

Fired off a letter to DSAR team.......... i never got microfiches for 1989/1990. They said they didn't retain the data. However my request for a statement provided the data. Although what i am interested in amongst other things is the credit/arrears balance. I've now asked for this information and how come i never got it initially. They're making me work hard at this, i think many people would give up by now. I'm keeping on going.

[Guest]

CCA request sent off by post along with £1 cheque.

What my statements do show and its whacky, is that my mortgage was quoted at £118.60 per month @ 12.75 %. I can also see that my mortgage did infact complete later than it should and the rate had indeed risen to 13.5% , They'd never requested any more, documentation shows this where i have queried the credit balance on my account from the get go. The same mortage two years later when the rate was 12.85% my expected payment was £112 .

I made a desision, once i know the total amount of interest paid to date then i will know that is the max value of the claim. I will base my court fees on that. But will limit my claim to "howsoever the Court see's fit"......... but could be up to that amount. I'm looking through at the various pricing options for JCS, and obviously i know the more work i do the better. They offer advocacy, drawing up etc... For now i'm drawing my lender through every question i am entitled to ask and compiling my "dossier" so to speak. Thats pretty much a very time consuming task in itself, but getting it conscise, chronological etc.. requires quite a bit of thinking about. When i'm ready and i've still a way to go yet i'll put the lot to them and i won't miss a beat this time.

[Guest]

My email to DSAR team ( i have their direct email) has not been answered. So i'll have to follow it up with snail mail. My further complaint to "Complaints" has not been answered either. I'm a great proponent of self help and research and sharing information. In this vein i'll carry on.

[Guest]

Not sure how i missed this one. I'm keeping the postman busy if nothing else.

[Guest]

Hi again,
i know i'm keeping this thread going by replying to myself. The whole situation is driving me crackers. I'll give this particular subject one more pop, and if i get advice then great if not then i'll just move on with this.

My mortgage i have identified is a Consumer Regulated Agreement, started in 1989, value less than £15K. As such all the provisions of the Act (1974) apply to me. As i feel so wronged by my creditor unilaterally changing my agreement, i've challenged it. It was rebuffed in 1997, 1999,2002 etc....... And latterly in 2021, and in 2022 the FOS have refused to look at it on a "time constraint basis". You can imagine my frustration so far, you can also imagine how i feel over paying an extra 10 years on a mortgage when i never done a thing wrong. Thats where i am.

I do of course have an option, i can take my lender to Court. That is expensive in every way. The fees for potential damages would lead me to court fees alone in excess of £1500, thats before any legal representation i would require, and to be honest i will probably need some help.

The Financial Conduct Authority say this over unilateral changes:



So, in effect even knowing that my creditor was not allowed to do what they done............ i'm still powerless. Unless i want to initiate expensive court action. Section 82(1) is exactly what happened to me. Not like i can ring the Police and report it. It applies automatically .............. but it wasn't applied.

Knowing my account is a consumer regulated agreement, i have now bombarded my creditor with every question i am entitled to ask. Should they fail any point i will ask them to suspend collection on my account until the breach is rectified. If i do not pay they will want to do something. If they fulfill every request i make then i will still ask them to rectify the breach of S82(1) before i recommence payment. Just how they could rectify that breach, or even if they would / could.......... i've no idea.

The amount outstanding on my mortgage at present is roughly £1.5k . Similar to a court fee.

If i was to fail my payments and be taken to court it will cost me nothing. If i was to defend on an unfair relationship scenario that could lead to an undoing of all interest charges to me if i won. If lost, i'll still owe them £1.5k ? Plus legal expenses. I can't see how i would lose?

I appreciate this is a niche topic, hope i'm not being rude or ungrateful but if no one can assist me here can i ask would L beegles be any better placed to help me ?

[Roger]

Well you need advice

Here I think is a crucial moment. Its the Closing of a CCA 74 regulated Account.
If my understanding is correct you are saying it started as a CCA 74 Mortgage/Debt and then at some later date this was closed? The Debt continued under a NON CCA 74 terms.

Well I don't know what a CCA 74 Mortgage would or should look like but under the Consumer Credit Act there are a necessary checks and constraints.
So you need advice.
It may be that this was UE (who knows?)

Contact @Colin G Quinn
You need advice don't go digging a pit for yourself! I doubt if you are the only person in this situation! This is where the Legal training and knowledge becomes paramount!

[Guest]

Well you need advice

Here I think is a crucial moment. Its the Closing of a CCA 74 regulated Account.
If my understanding is correct you are saying it started as a CCA 74 Mortgage/Debt and then at some later date this was closed? The Debt continued under a NON CCA 74 terms.

Well I don't know what a CCA 74 Mortgage would or should look like but under the Consumer Credit Act there are a necessary checks and constraints.
So you need advice.
It may be that this was UE (who knows?)

Contact @Colin G Quinn
You need advice don't go digging a pit for yourself! I doubt if you are the only person in this situation! This is where the Legal training and knowledge becomes paramount!

Hiya Roger, your understanding is not correct. This whole thread so far has been a fact finding mission, but i've got there in the end. I now know my facts. Let me recap:

Mortgage started in Jan 1989, circa £13K . It was regulated under the CCA , 1974 (still is). It was for 25 years term.

Apropos of nothing, and with out my knowledge it was "extended" by 10 years in 1993.

I found out about this "extension" quite by accident in 1997. From when i found out in 1997 and until 2001/2002 i contacted them regularly asking for an explanation of how this could of happened, why did it happen , it doesn't seem right, whats going on etc........... Each time i was told it happened because i didn't pay insurance premiums and i'd also failed to pay the correct interest rate. I conceeded reluctantly that i must of caused this myself. I'd spent nearly 5 years querying this.

By chance, in 2021 i found out that my lender had a history of doing this to people without their knowledge. I also found out that they had been ordered by FOS (at the time) to put matters right and reconstitute accounts so they would be as they should be. My lender had teams of people (according to the press) that where working on it to find out people who where affected by this issue and put matters right. When i read this, i made complaint to my lender. I naievley assumed they would say............. "yes, you're one of the ones we missed, we'll get things sorted with you". They didn't. What they did say was............ "what you are complaining about happened in 1993, you should of complained earlier and in any event you should of complained within 6 years of when you knew you had a complaint". Complaint dismissed. I run my complaint through the FOS, they came to the same conclusion. I then run my complaint throught the FOS again, because initially it was an investigator that made the desision, so this time i got an actual Ombudsman desision................ "we can't look at the complaint as its over 6 years old".

So thats where i was up to. And just for the avoidance of any doubt, the account is still current and still active. The finish date for the account is November 2024. I'm still paying it, i've not been in arrears nor default, ever . So, what to do next ?

[Guest]

So, what did i do next ? I read and read and read. And to be honest, it took me sometime to even understand fully the contents of my DSAR. MY mortgage "extended" in 1993, without my knowledge. That would be agreed and backed up by their own correspondance. However:
CCA, 1974:
82 Variation of agreements.

(1)Where, under a power contained in a regulated agreement, the creditor or owner varies the agreement, the variation shall not take effect before notice of it is given to the debtor or hirer in the prescribed manner.

And in the words of the FCA............. a unilateral variation is precluded from taking effect [unless the above conditions are met].
Could they give me notice now and effect it ? I've no idea.

Also , my DSAR showed up my account as an "Arranged Repayment schedule" . Now i'm no expert in any of this but that would suggest thats an an agreement ? With who ?

Upshot is , i've been paying an arranged/ varied agreement for 30 years, that should not of took effect. I've also took issue with this previously, many times. I've fired off a pre claim to them. And the short story is that i have alleged an Unfair Relationship pursuant to 140 (A) CCA. In effect it was unfair for them to do to me what they where prohibited from doing, and it continues as they justify it and repeat it. Etc........

I sent a CCA request off about 21st June. That should tell me what i have paid to date and give me an idea of a figure for my claim. It should also show my agreement, and any subsequent variations. Given their own correspondance show there has been none, this will be interesting. Cheque for £1 was cashed on 28th June. I'd guess i'll get my docs any day now.

A conservative guess is that i've paid £36K under the agreement so far. Thats what i am seeking to recover. I've not a doubt that i will lose my case. My doubt is that a court may award me the interest i paid circa £23k, or the total £36K or even the total with 8% interest simple, plus costs should i instruct a solicitor, which i've resigned myself i will probably have to do.

There are lots of other problems with the account in the years prior to 1993. For example, incorrect payments/interest rates. Wrong allocation of payment year (early interest posting) that have all made the account incorrect, although at the same time never in deficiet............. But enough to show a complete lack of any accounting.

My gut instinct 25 years ago was that it was wrong. Its took me that time to realise that section 82 of the CCA confirms it. Keep ya posted as always..............