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HSBC had famously terrible systems when I dealt with them for a mortgage years ago - they were so bad that the staff I spoke with pre-briefed me on the range of

HSBC had famously terrible systems when I dealt with them for a mortgage years ago - they were so bad that the staff I spoke with pre-briefed me on the range of issues their website could suffer from. The best was that certain sections were circular, so it would start to ask the same questions again but displaying answers prefilled in - yet it would arbitrarily forget particular (different) details on each loop, defaulting to values other than what you'd entered before, so there were only certain points you should exit the loop at, to be sure it would submit the right information! On the plus side, despite their system woes, they had very competitive rates, so it was definitely financially worth spending another 20 minutes and accepting their idiocy!

ralferoo 1y ago
This wasn't so much a competitive rate, but I literally couldn't have afforded to buy this house if they didn't offer a 105% mortgage - so no deposit and some extra money so I could buy some furniture. To be fair, I had some deposit so didn't really need all the extra 5%, but I wasn't anywhere close to the 10% deposit that was standard at the time. Also, now I remember that I also had to jump through some deceptive hoops. The deal was technically only available on the graduate account, which my account had stopped being earlier in the year because it changed to a regular account after 10 years from opening. The bank manager said she'd bend the rules and let me have the deal as an exception, but then presented me with a load of life insurance policies to sign (which of course I didn't want or need) and it was strongly intimated that if I didn't sign them, she'd no longer bother bending the rules to get me the mortgage deal. So, I signed them, and as soon as I had the mortgage confirmation letter through the post I phoned up to cancel before the end of the 14 day cooling off period. I dread to think how much commission she'd have made from me if I didn't cancel.

ralferoo 1y ago

This wasn't so much a competitive rate, but I literally couldn't have afforded to buy this house if they didn't offer a 105% mortgage - so no deposit and some extra money so I could buy some furniture. To be fair, I had some deposit so didn't really need all the extra 5%, but I wasn't anywhere close to the 10% deposit that was standard at the time. Also, now I remember that I also had to jump through some deceptive hoops. The deal was technically only available on the graduate account, which my account had stopped being earlier in the year because it changed to a regular account after 10 years from opening. The bank manager said she'd bend the rules and let me have the deal as an exception, but then presented me with a load of life insurance policies to sign (which of course I didn't want or need) and it was strongly intimated that if I didn't sign them, she'd no longer bother bending the rules to get me the mortgage deal. So, I signed them, and as soon as I had the mortgage confirmation letter through the post I phoned up to cancel before the end of the 14 day cooling off period. I dread to think how much commission she'd have made from me if I didn't cancel.