Danske bank to close retail customer accounts

pricewise987 wrote: »

I am a customer as well but I imagine if you look at the small print of any agreement you signed you will find perfectly legal exit clauses similar to the one below.....

They reserve the right to terminate the Contract at any time for Business and/or Financial reasons

Did you read your contract to confirm no such exit clause exists?

Please tell me you can't find it and we are all on the YOP gravy train.....

Whatever the solution for Offset Mortgages is, you will still need a Personal bank A/c somewhere else....!!!

3. Variation


[FONT=Danske Text,Danske Text][FONT=Danske Text,Danske Text]3.1 We may at any time, for any reason set in Clause 3.3 below:

a) add to, remove or change the number of and/or nature of products and benefits which we offer to holders of a Package;

b) introduce a fee or charge applicable to a Package and/or products and benefits selected by you from time to time and/or vary the amount, frequency or time for payment of such fees or charges;

c) add to, remove, change or impose restrictions on the products and benefits available to holders of a Package;

d) make any change to the Terms and Conditions; or

e) make any change to a Mandate.

3.2 We will always give you at least one month’s notice (or such longer notice period as we may be required by law, regulation or regulatory requirement to provide you) before making any change described in Clause 3.1. If the change is to your detriment we will give you the notice in writing. Otherwise we may notify you in writing or by advertisement in the national press and also by putting a message on our Website or by e-mail. If you continue to use the Bank’s services after receiving notification of any of the changes set out in Clause 3.1, it will mean that you have agreed to the change.

3.3 The changes referred to in Clause 3.1 above will be made for one of the Variation Reasons.
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"If you look at the small print".... I did and there isn't a clause of that nature in my mortgage agreement. There is a clause which covers transfer to another institution though.

are the T&Cs of the NIB offset mortgages online anywhere

kennM wrote: »

Not that I know of but haven't gone looking personally... I've an offset and I've gone through my terms and conditions and there isn't a clause to terminate. There is a clause which covers the transfer to a different institution but I think thats in the context of selling a mortgage book etc.

From what I can tell contractually that is the primary option open to them.... after that its negotiation to arrive at acceptable terms. Otherwise its breech of contract law.

thats me understanding also the only way they can force them off the books is to transfer them, no matter what incentive they offer they cant force anyone to go. Sit tight and dont accept the first offer.

I'm in the process of switching over from Danske to Permanent TSB and have been using their 'switch buddy' process. Honestly though, I wish I had done it myself and had more control of the process.

I had my appt at the bank on the 3rd Jan to open the accounts and the 'switch' was planned for Wed 8th.

Wed 8th I get a phone call from PTSB to advise that they have only just received the paperwork and therefore the switch needs to be delayed for a week until the 15th and then it will take a week for the switch to go through fully. It was only at this phone call was i then advised not to use my Danske account anymore as if there are any pending transactions the switch won't go through and that from the 15th the account will be closed. Due to the delay in the switch they advised me to contact two of my direct debits to advise them myself of the change in bank details as it wouldn't be done in time from their end.

Massive issues with my Danske Credit card payment and no idea if that is going to go through on the 17th when due - despite sending them the form on Mon 6th to change payment details they have advised me they can't change this direct debit. However apparently my account is closed from today so that is probably going to bounce back. Danske have said I can pay it twice and they will reverse one into my account with them but the account will be closed so I don't know how that is meant to work.

Also I have just realised I have a personal loan payment due tomorrow that wasn't included in what PTSB told me would be affected by the change in switch dates, and I have no idea if it has been switched over and therefore if tomorrow it is going to come out of my PTSB account or if they are going to try and take it out of my Danske account which may or may not be open and doesn't have the funds in it anymore to cover it anyway. And to top it all off I have left my mobile at work so I can't ring to check and that is driving my bananas!

If I had done it all myself I could have spent a couple of hours on the phone on Monday 6th Jan, filled in a few forms and it would all have been done. Instead it's this limbo where I don't know exactly what is happening and when and I don't like not being in control!

hopefully others switching processes have been a bit more straightforward.

marathonic wrote: »

Well, their only three options regarding tracker mortgages are:

• Run the tracker mortgage book down themselves;
• Sell the tracker book to another bank at a discount - the discount would be significant because it'd need to cover the losses being made on the mortgage itself, the other banks admin costs and the other banks desired profit;
• Offer customers a discount to repay their mortgage early or switch to another banks SVR. For example, for every 100 euro owed, they might reduce it to 80 euro if you transfer to another bank. I believe the debt writedown would be a taxable event and the mortgage holder would be liable to Capital Gains Tax

In my opinion, the first option is the most likely route they'll choose, perhaps offering the third option to the holders of the longer-term tracker mortgage so as to allow them to pull out completely as early as possible.

I suspect a lot of these mortgages are now in negative equity so there's a possibility they'll offer a deal for partial paydown of your mortgage to bring it back into positive equity. This would make the loan book more attractive to other banks because the security offered (the houses) would cover the outstanding debt better.

I imagine Danske's propensity to opt for option 1 or 2 may be down to the Head Office's desire to cleanse themselves (or not) of their Irish legacy issues. It may be easier to convince their shareholders that they've dealt with the problem if they simply sell the book of business. Theoretically that would then enable them to concentrate on more profitable business and avoid wasting resources. As Marathonic points out though, the book would have to be sold at a significant discount.

A cheaper option than selling the book of business would be to offer discounts for early repayment. But this only really works if all its customers could pay off their loans, and there are no future administration costs. Clearly only a proportion of people will be able to pay off their loan.

The trouble with offering discounts is:
1. The discount has to be large enough to entice people to pay off the loan. At the moment, even if you have the money to pay off a tracker loan, you can earn more in interest in an instant access KBC account, even accounting for 41% DIRT than you are probably paying on a Danske Bank tracker loan. Also, people may prefer to have the money and still not pay back the loan, even if they were gaining less on the savings account than they were paying on the mortgage account either for "a rainy day" or to invest elsewhere.

2. Anyone who pays off their loan makes the remaining book of business worse for a potential purchaser, since they have lost a good quality borrower.

Regarding the issue about having to pay CGT on any "writedown", what precedent was set in 2011 when PTSB offered a 10% credit for borrowers who paid back their tracker loans? I don't recall hearing anything about tax being applied to the credit then. I also don't think there were huge numbers taking up the offer either. To get any kind of traction on people paying back their tracker loans early to mitigate the effects pointed out in 1 above, I imagine you'd need to offer in the region of a minimum net 20% discount or more, after allowing for any CGT due.

Halifax cc holders were given a personal loan for the balance over 5 years regardless of the balance. You could pay of early by bank transfer at any time.

But once you missed 2 repayments the balance was transferred to a debt collection agency who are a disaster and have no idea what is owed or paid.

Fees are retrospective - I just got my "pre-notification of interest and charges" and it covers 01.10.2013 to 31.12.2013

Does anyone know what happens with unused cheques?

I heard that you can claim back the stamp duty on the unused cheques but am finding it difficult to get a definitive answer on this. I think it is called a medallion return or something like that.

ABC101 wrote: »

Not much point in paying a higher % rate for an Offset... but then being denied a current account to offset against it is there?

Perhaps in anticipation of this issue, the offset rate has been lower than the variable rate since last summer. I couldn't figure out then why they did that, but with their withdrawal from the market, I guess there's an angle there somewhere.