Mortgage meltdown: Bank chaos as families rush to freeze payments as homeowners tell of 10-hour wait on helplines
- Chancellor Rishi Sunak offered homeowners a three-month mortgage break
- Lenders now asking borrowers to submit applications online to free up phones
- Borrowers who do take a break will still be charged interest on their mortgage
Banks are struggling to cope with a flood of calls from frantic families desperate to freeze their mortgage payments.
Anxious borrowers are being forced to wait hours to speak to someone, with one angry homeowner complaining of a ten-hour delay when trying to get through to Santander.
Many lenders are now asking borrowers to submit applications online to free up their helplines, or to only call if they are vulnerable or facing immediate difficulty.
Businessman Tim White (pictured with his wife Rachel and daughters Sophia and Saskia) spent nine hours on the phone to NatWest to ask for a payment holiday
The calls were triggered by Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s announcement that homeowners in financial difficulty as a result of the coronavirus pandemic will be offered a three-month mortgage break, or ‘payment holiday’.
Borrowers who decide to take a break will still be charged interest on their mortgage over the three-month period, but the holiday should give them breathing space to get their finances in order.
Martyn James, of complaints website Resolver, said: ‘While the extraordinary impact of the coronavirus is unprecedented, big businesses are supposed to have crisis plans in place for worst-case scenarios like this.
‘The mortgage payment holiday is a vital lifeline for millions and should not be complicated to implement – so it’s a real concern that some lenders are failing their customers by not having a plan in place.’
The City watchdog yesterday issued new official guidance spelling out what banks and building societies must do to help their customers.
Christopher Woolard, interim chief executive of the Financial Conduct Authority, said: ‘We want to help firms support consumers during these unprecedented times.
‘In particular, we are making it clear that no responsible lender should be considering repossession as an appropriate measure at this time.’
The regulator added that banks must not charge customers any additional fees for taking a payment holiday and said the break should not damage people’s credit scores.
A Santander spokesman said: ‘Only customers who know they’re going to miss their next monthly payment due should call at this time.’
The bank is also asking customers to use social media or its online chat service to get in touch.
Many high street banks have created special payment holiday request forms which are available on their websites.
Santander, Halifax and Lloyds Bank, NatWest and Nationwide borrowers can all ask for a payment break online without needing to telephone their bank.
Families who have mortgages with Barclays and HSBC still need to speak to an adviser on the phone to ask for the three-month freeze.
The calls were triggered by Chancellor Rishi Sunak’s announcement that homeowners in financial difficulty as a result of the coronavirus pandemic will be offered a three-month mortgage break, or ‘payment holiday’
Nationwide said it was aiming to respond to borrowers who have filled out the online form within five to seven working days.
Halifax said it will respond to borrowers who apply online within two to three working days by text message to let them know if their application has been accepted.
HSBC does not yet have an automatic payment holiday process in place but said if customers called the bank and left their details it will respond when a system was up and running.
HSBC said: ‘Coronavirus is having an ever-growing impact on our colleagues and it is becoming increasingly difficult to maintain service levels through our contact centres and branches.’