Advice needed - Ulster Bank Mortgage

Lpfsox

Hi folks, hope someone can give some advice please as Ulster Bank are doing my head in with this issue!

My mortgage was taken out with First Active which was taken over by Ulster Bank. I took the mortgage out in 2008 and got a tracker which I (foolishly in hindsight, but there you go) fixed at 5.1% for 3 years. Tracker rate is ECB + 1.15%. Anyway the fixed period ended in March and I reverted back to the tracker rate; saving nearly €500 a month in the process.

I asked the bank to continue taking the amount which I'd always paid from my current account which they agreed to do, provided I put the request in writing which I did. I specified that Ulster Bank were to take a fixed amount any any changes in the ECB were to be absorbed by this overpayment unless the ECB rate rose to a level above which I would have to increase my payments.

Ulster Bank acknowledged this and for 2 months more or less got the payments right (some minor issues which I didn't quibble with). Since then they've consistently failed to take the right amount of money, despite numerous phone calls, e-mails and letters.

I've invoked their complaints procedures, received letters of apology and even bottles of wine as a token of their apologies but still they get it wrong. Every time the ECB changes Ulster Bank hike up the amount they take from me, despite agreeing to a fixed payment initially. Finally last month they admitted that they can only deal with a fixed overpayment instead of a fixed maximum payment, so instead of a customer paying, for example, €1,000 monthly with €500 owed as a payment and €500 being an overpayment, absorbing ECB changes within the overpayment as long as it was sufficient to cover them; the customer is required to specify an amount to overpay which will not change so if the ECB changes the customer must either accept a higher payment or manually request that the overpayment change to a different specified amount in writing, ie that if the mortgage repayment were to rise to €600 then an overpayment of €500 would still be taken unless I write to Ulster Bank to instruct that the overpayment be reduced to €400.

I decided that I've had enough of this and asked if I could set them up as a beneficiary on my online banking (I'm with BOI) so that I can set the direct debit to the amount actually owed each month and manually make overpayments through the online banking which would mean I control the amount overpaid. Ulster Bank wrote back confirming this would be ok and gave me an account number and sort code (some sort of suspense account I think) with instructions to tag payments with my mortgage account number; so far so good. They also suggested an alternative where I could set up a standing order with BOI to transfer money into the same suspense account if I preferred.

When I went to set up the account I kept getting sort code/account code mismatch errors so I rank Ulster Bank and explained the problem and asked to check the account numbers again. They confirmed they were correct and there is only one such set of numbers which all customers are issued with in this sort of situation. Then I rang BOI and got them to check from their side what was going on and they told me that the account given by Ulster Bank can't accept payments from BOI and that several other customers have had this problem.

Anyone else had this problem or know of any way of resolving this? Ulster Bank's customer service has, in my experience, been so awful that I really don't want to get dragged around their systems any longer but I feel that while I'm a position to do so I would like to make regular overpayments on my mortgage and there isn't an Ulster Bank branch local to me where I could do this manually.

unclebill98

This is simple down to the fact it's an old FA mortagae integrated into UB. Can cause hassle and with what you are trying to do is not the norm.

As stated the issue happens when the ecb rate changes. Apart from paying manually there is little more the bank can do cause the system is not set up to allow for what you want and they simply can not have someone pay attention to your mortgage specially.

Poor service, yes but there's only so much the system allows.

UB are open on a sat if that's any use otherwise there is not much more you can do. Apart from compensation every time you complain even if you reffered to the ombudsman there is still nothing UB can do.

Lpfsox

thanks for the response unclebill, I wasn't looking for someone to take special notice of the account - of course that would be ridiculous - but was frustrated that the account numbers given to facilitate interbank payments can't be used (is that because it's something to do with First Active?)

phormium

As above, exactly right. Mortgage is on old FA system and can't cater for out of the ordinary changes like this. As you are on a tracker rate can you get a higher interest rate for the surplus/overpayment funds you have each month with a regular savings account and then transfer a lump sum maybe once a year or let it build up to whatever amount they specify you need for it to be considered a lump sum payment, used to be 5% of original mortgage.

unclebill98

Lpfsox wrote: »

thanks for the response unclebill, I wasn't looking for someone to take special notice of the account - of course that would be ridiculous - but was frustrated that the account numbers given to facilitate interbank payments can't be used (is that because it's something to do with First Active?)

Afraid so. I agree it's annoying but all old FA customers use this account.

phormium wrote: »

As above, exactly right. Mortgage is on old FA system and can't cater for out of the ordinary changes like this. As you are on a tracker rate can you get a higher interest rate for the surplus/overpayment funds you have each month with a regular savings account and then transfer a lump sum maybe once a year or let it build up to whatever amount they specify you need for it to be considered a lump sum payment, used to be 5% of original mortgage.

This is grand in theory but overall it would be better to make the over payment monthly.

coolbananas99

I had a similar issue trying to set up a monthly standing order from my AIB current account to my UB Mortgage account. Was able to do this with First Active in the past but since move to UB this is not possible because of a restriction on inter-bank payments into UB mortgage accounts.

The way I got around it was to open an Ulster Bank current account with no ATM or Laser card, so no stamp duty. I then set up a monthly standing order from AIB current account to UB current account. I then set up another monthly standing order from my UB current account to my UB mortgage via UB online banking. I can now control the standing order amount and frequency and make additional manual payments if I want to.