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A VICTIM OF the tracker mortgage scandal has expressed her frustration at her treatment by Bank of Ireland after it informed her she had been overcharged for years on her home loan.
It emerged last year that financial institutions in Ireland had charged thousands of customers denied tracker rates and charged higher interest rates than stipulated in their agreements. The Central Bank estimates almost 10,000 accounts have been impacted.
The woman, who does not wish to be named, told TheJournal.ie that she was first told of the overcharging on her account in December last year.
“In my case, it had been for a little over eight years. It was the usual story, I switched to a fixed rate in 2006 when interest rates were rising. When they came back down, I asked to go back on it, but I was denied the right to return to a tracker,” she explained.
The bank’s initial letter, seen by TheJournal.ie, states the customer had “been charged an incorrect rate of interest on your mortgage for a period of time”.
It adds that it will move her to the tracker rate set out in her mortgage documentation “to ensure that you do not experience any further detriment as a result of our failure”.
The letter also said the bank would write to update her in February 2017 to provide an update on:
The explanation of the exact circumstances that caused our failure in the first place
Any redress and compensation that may be due to you once finalised
Details of a payment towards the cost of independent professional advice that you may wish to seek
The independent appeals process that will be available to you.
The letter she received in February contained none of this information.
Instead, it stated that, “given the scale and complexity of this examination, your mortgage account remains under review and this work is still ongoing”.
The bank informed her that once her account had been fully reviewed, it would write to her with an update on the four points it referenced in its initial letter.
“I was eagerly awaiting that letter in February but there was nothing in it, it was just a fob-off. There has been nothing in the way of an update since. So, I thought I’d give them six months [from the first letter] and I rang last week looking for an update. There was no information, I was just completely stonewalled,” she said.
“They said it may not be until the end of this year now. I just got so mad, they just don’t seem to get the disruption it caused in people’s lives – there doesn’t seem to be an urgency to refund people’s own money.”
‘Struggling’
The woman has estimated she is owed as much as €15,000.
“It’s a load of money that I could have earmarked for other things,” she said. During the period of time she was overcharged, her mother was suffering from dementia and she had to pay for home care for two years.
“I’m a public sector worker, so I’m not badly paid, but I wouldn’t have spare cash to spend. From month-to-month I was genuinely struggling I had enough stress going on at that time without having to worry about my finances. And my story is nothing compared to what some people went through – some people lost their homes.”
She said she believes financial institutions who overcharged their customers need to be held to account, both by the Central Bank and by the country’s politicians.
“If I owed them that amount, or was six months in arrears, they’d be ringing me every day. When I ring them once in six months for an update, they treat me like an inconvenience,” she said.
“It’s frustrating when you consider how much money we put into those banks.”
In response to a query from TheJournal.ie about progress with its redress scheme, Bank of Ireland referred back to a statement in made in December last year.
This statement from six months ago stated the bank had identified 602 accounts where a right to, or the option of, a tracker rate of interest was not provided to the customer in accordance with their loan documentation.
It also identified 3,916 accounts on a tracker rate that was not the rate specified in their loan agreement. The bank offered its apologies to affected customers and committed to commencing with refunds in the first quarter of this year.
If you have been affected by the tracker mortgage scandal, we want to hear your story. Get in touch by sending a message to trackermortgage@thejournal.ie.
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I won’t be voting for any of those parties.
You’ll be glad to know that FG are topping the opinion polls.
@9QRixo8H: The real poll will take place tomorrow.
@Gavan Hogan:
Unfortunately Gavan, he might be right.
Although I personally think SF will shade it nationally
@Gavan Hogan: cool, I will.
Not one mention of crime. Antisocial behaviour is absolutely rampant in inner city Dublin. Drug dealing is quite literally on every street corner in Dublin 1. Kids on scramblers rallying up and down through traffic on bikes they’ve either robbed or bought with the proceeds of crime. Ffs the only party I see mention antisocial behaviour is those absolute loons in the national party. Why do I have to look to the far right ethnonationalists before I find a party that takes crime seriously? Can anybody recommend local councillors in the inner city that focus on crime reduction? Advocates for more prisons or reopening old ones? The soft touch approach has clearly failed for all to see.
Oh wait, more fool me, just saw the paragraph where labour wants “wardens” handing out fines for antisocial beheviour. I’m sure that’ll stop it! LOL. How many fines were paid to councils for things like dog poop in the past 4 years? A quick Google search shows 1 (yes, one in 4 years). Why do they think fining people for this will help?
@Sean Stevenson: but, how many were faced to clean up.before been fined?
@Sean Stevenson: very well said and so true.
We all know how much a promise from a politician is worth. Why not check the promises they made previously and how they’ve lived up to them. Or not.
More false promises that mean nothing to the people of Ireland
Blowing up a school now Israel…what happened…miss the orphanage? Ah well not to worry, plenty time for that!
@Ulysses 31: Ah bless…have I got to the racist thicko…good.
@damien leen: Maybe if Hamas stops building tunnels and hiding flammable ammo under schools and kids bedrooms. It’s either Israel blowing it up or Hamas firing those rockets at Israel ( good thing there’s the Iron dome) – I know what I would do.
Politics seem to attract poor specimens of society, ie, accomplished sleight-of-hand artists and polished liars. It’s best to vote them out regularly and not leave them too long in government!
FF was the largest party since 2019 local election, will they continue to be the largest after tomorrow or will people vote change? #VoteTomorrow.
Apathy and cynicism will be the ruin of us all.
None of them mention ensuring economic growth or how much extra they will tax and misspend??
@Eric: economic growth is not something county councils are exceptionally renowned for. They should have more powers to attract investment though.
As for taxing… County councils only collect commercial rates I think? Happy to be corrected if I’m wrong
It’s great that they can get rid or lower taxes and yet increase services
Could probably have bundled most of the looney parties here into one doc to save time. That document could then more easily be put through a shredder and recycled into toilet paper or perhaps bedding for someone who maybe keeps rodents as a pet.
Lol! so a whole pile of nothing? not a road, bridge, train, etc. ‘empower local council’… to be against any national plans? It’s 2 steps back, if we’ve learned anything it’s that we cant solve the problems facing us, putting more people infront of these problems will make it even harder.
have your say