Tracker Mortgage Decision Reference 2021-0221

• Case Outcome: Rejected
• Reference: 2021-0221
• Date: 28 June 2021
• Year: 2021
• Subject Matter: Tracker Mortgage
• Conducts Complained Of: Failure to offer a tracker rate throughout the life of the mortgage
• Finantial Sector: Banking

Decision Ref:

2021-0221

Sector:

Banking

Product / Service:

Tracker Mortgage

Conduct(s) complained of:

Failure to offer a tracker rate throughout the life of

the mortgage

Outcome:

Rejected

LEGALLY BINDING DECISION

OF THE FINANCIAL SERVICES AND PENSIONS OMBUDSMAN

This complaint relates to one of two mortgage loan accounts held by the Complainants

with the Provider. The two mortgage loan accounts held by the Complainants with the

Provider are detailed below;

• Mortgage loan account ending 6093 was drawn down in July 2005 in the amount of

€268,870 for a term of 35 years on a standard variable rate of 3.3%. This mortgage

loan account was secured on the Complainants’ private dwelling house. It is this

mortgage loan account that is the subject of this complaint. Mortgage loan account

ending 6093 was redeemed on 31 July 2018.

• Mortgage loan account ending 6176 is a top-up loan which was drawn down in

2007 in the amount of €35,000 for a term of 20 years. This mortgage loan account

was also secured on the Complainants’ private dwelling house. The Loan Offer

Letter dated 9 August 2007 provided for 1-year discounted tracker interest rate of

4.6% (ECB + 0.6%), with a tracker interest rate of 5.1% (ECB + 1.1%) to apply

thereafter. This mortgage loan account is not the subject of this complaint.

- 2 -

/Cont’d…

The Complainants’ Case

The Complainants maintain that the “[l]oan documentation for [their] home mortgage

letter of offer outlines that the tracker rate is an option on drawdown”. The Complainants

submit that they, together with the Provider “signed up to and entered into this agreement

with this option in place”. The Complainants further submit that the Provider “stopped

offering tracker rates in [late] 2008” however they “would like to have the tracker rate

option as per the original loan documentation / agreement”.

The First Complainant contends that he “wrote to [the Provider] in quarter 1 of 2015

requesting that a tracker rate be applied to [his] mortgage account”. The First Complainant

details that the Provider indicated that this was not possible as the tracker rate product

was no longer available. The First Complainant further contends that he “made numerous

phone calls to [the Provider] over the first half of 2015 outlining that [his] original loan

documentation had outlined that this product was available to [him] on signing the

mortgage loan documentation”. However, the Complainants state that despite these

numerous telephone calls, the Provider insisted that they were not entitled to have a

tracker interest rate applied to their mortgage loan account ending 6093.

The Complainants maintain that at the time their mortgage loan was drawn down, they

“had been offered three interest rate products”. The Complainants contend that a tracker

interest rate product offering “was openly discussed and sold as a product on offer as part

of the pre-drawdown of the 35-year mortgage”. The First Complainant states that “[a]

number of years post [his] mortgage drawdown (duration of 35 years), 1 of the 3 interest

rate products, in [this] case the tracker rate, was withdrawn and no longer available to

[him]”. The First Complainant contends that he “signed up to this and yet, approximately

12 years into [his] Mortgage Loan Account [ending 6093] [he is] unable to have the tracker

rate as an option”. The Complainants state that they “don’t understand why the Mortgage

Loan Account [ending 6093] has no entitlement to a tracker rate”.

The Complainants are seeking;

a) The option of a tracker interest rate to be offered on mortgage loan account ending

6093; and

b) Redress and compensation in relation to same.