When we decided to move house we also decided to move mortgages. We had been using Abbey National for six months but in that time we’d had some pretty bad service. On one occasion I had changed the account that the mortgage payments came out of. I did this by phone. Shortly a new direct debit mandate arrived which I signed and sent back. Job done. Soon after I started receiving letters telling me we were in arrears. Evidently, despite setting up a new direct debit, Abbey National hadn’t done their end of things. A couple of heated phone calls later and it was sorted.
Because we were tied into Abbey National for two years, we attempted to get a mortgage for the house we wanted to buy but were told that we needed to have two mortgages with them rather than one. I wont bore you with the insane details but at that point we thought “f&*k you very much Abbey National” and decided to pay the £600 redemption fee and leave the “because life’s complicated enough” bank forever.
So it came as no suprise when I unearthed this report.
It seems that we’re not alone either. This guy set up a blog based on his bad experiences with the bank.