Are you a victim of a mortgage blunder?

THOUSANDS of Abbey borrowers who may have unwittingly had their mortgage terms extended by up to 15 years have been warned they are running out of time to seek compensation.

The lender routinely changed mortgage terms when interest rates moved in the 1980s, but the way its loans were calculated was so baffling that customers were often left in the dark.
Many borrowers only realised much later that their terms had been extended, and have had to fork out thousands of pounds more than they expected to clear their mortgages.
The Financial Ombudsman Service has ruled that between 1987 and 1993 Abbey failed in its duty to explain that terms could be increased, and borrowers could be entitled to compensation.
Anyone who took out a Abbey repayment loan in the 1980s and early 1990s would have had their mortgage calculated in this way. An estimated 25,000
people a year could have been affected.
The ombudsman has dealt with several hundred Abbey cases and said there could be hundreds more people who have not come forward because they do not realise they could be entitled to compensation. The window for lodging a complaint is likely to expire this year.

If you think you may have been affected, let us know.

Comments

[Mr P M Hon]

I expect my 25 year endownment mortgage with Woolwich to be matured by 2011. Recently I paid off a large amount of the mortgage. Last Friday I and my wife went down to my local Barclay (Woolwich is now taken over by Barclay) to query about the new monthly repayment. We were shocked that the mortgage will mature in 2021.

[Susan Charlton]

Abbey National increased our mortgage by 3 years. Only found out when looked into paying off mortgage early. When interest rates increased always paid higher rate. Spent 1 year trying to find out why they increased the term. Eventually said it was to do with building insurance tied in with mortgage. Rubbish. Paid off mortgage early few years ago. We were never satisfied with Abbey's explanation.

[kunwar narain saigal]

hi
just read your article on sundaytimes "abbey accused over mortgage shortfalls" i have been the victim of this. i had my mortgage form march 1978 with abbey. i also had payed lumpsum time to time. i do have all the records with me. I did go through all their procedure of complain.even written to obudsman but no help came through at that time.my case was handled by mr peter birch and jenefer newell. i was offered £500 towards but i did not accept it . i asked details of my account only at that time and they refused everytime.i could not go to a solicitor as i did not had enough money for the case. Though i have paid my mortgage now but they were unfair IN DEALING with me.they did extended the terms without my knowledge our balance was not going down when i saw this HAPPENING i did complained about it. If you could help i will be grateful OR ADVISE WHAT TO DO . please if it is possible to meet you and discuss this case it will be great help.i also can bring all the correspondence with me.you will be able to see yourself what they havedone.
thanks hope to hear from you.

[margaret weir]

I was very interested to read the article about Abbey National extending mortgage terms. We have had the same problem. We took out a mortgage in 1981. All the payments were made on time including increases. However, Abbey also sent out slips of paper that had to be returned stating that the new payment was being made. According to Abbey National i failed to return at least one of these and this resulted in our mortgage term being increased by four and a half years. I got nowhere arguing the case with Abbey and we remortgaged with a different building society in 1999. Neither myself nor any of my family have had dealings with Abbey since.

[Brian Tyrer]

Re Kathryn Cooper article 1st July 07

I took out repayment mortgage in 1978 with Abbey. Rather than pay by direct debit I would call into my local branch and pay in person and get a receipt. The point of this being that as we had a variable rate mortgage, I could control my payments, increasing them as rates rose and reducing when they decreased (not in the early 80's though!!). Having an analytical mind and a mortgage was our biggest outlay, I was keen to understand how a repayment mortgage worked. This was not difficult to work out from my annual statements. Abbey would even include details in those days of how long it would take to repay at our current repayments (it was'nt long before they dropped that!!). Consequently, it was not hard to realise that in years of high interest rates it made sense to pay the minimum amount but as rates dropped in later years I kept my payments the same even increasing them as I could see that proportionatley, more of my payments went to the capital content of the loan and thereby reducing the outstanding term.There was a glitch in the late nineties when Abbey told me they were combining all three parts of the loan into one monthly payment( we like many, had taken further loans out over different terms) I realised immediately that the initial loan would now take much longer to repay as it was swallowed up with the interest on the other loans (gets a bit technical now) The upshot was that I made an arrangement to pay three separate amounts each month so keeping my original mortgage on target. This worked out fine and I was successful in repaying the mortgage when I wanted and kept control of how much interest I paid. The moral of my tale is that it would pay everyone with a mortgage to study the mechanics of how they work.

[Carole Storrie]

A few years ago my husband and I suddenly became aware of the extension to our mortgage term, which had been put on without our knowledge by the Halifax (then Building Society). This was queried by us and we were assured that when we came to pay it off at the time when it would have been due to finish(April 2005) it would all sort itself out. This was obviously not the case and how things stand at the moment is if we continue to pay at the rate we are paying my husband will be in his 80's before its finished. We have queried this again but have been told they could do what they liked and there is nothing we can do about it. Surely this is not right that they can alter you mortgage term without you written permission. What can we do about it?