UB Fixed rate to tracker

Ladylouth

Here is our situation, any comments would be welcome.

Took out tracker with UB in 05, and like others who have posted here it is very clearly a tracker for the life of the loan. Went fixed for two years in 06-08. Signed a form stating that at the end of the fixed term the loan would roll to Banks Home Loan rate at end of fixed term. Presumed that it meant tracker, probably, but didn't think a lot about it, as trackers weren't under the spotlight much then.

Summer 08, fixed term ended. Letter from bank said that we would now roll to SVR (this now defined Banks Home Loan rate for us), UNLESS we opted to (a) fix again, and if we did we would still have the "flexibility to explore our options at the end", OR (b) return to our tracker.

From this we deduced that Banks Home Loan Rate as signed by us in the first Fixed Rate Authority form meant SVR, and seemed to be a generic default rate, but we had been given the option to go back on the tracker rate, so no worries, our tracker was still intact.

We opted to fix for five years, signing a slightly different form, now referring to SVR at end of fixed rate. Our take on this was that since Home Loan Rate meant SVR and we signed that the first time and still could go back to tracker as a option, we were signing up to the same as before, the words had changed but it meant the same thing.

Of course, last summer the option to return to tracker was omitted. Wrote to UB, made our case, got final response letter refusing to re-instate tracker. Have case with FSO now, were offered mediation but bank refused. In summary, our case stands on this: we entered the exact same process twice, signed off on the same form in meaning both times, the first time were given the chance to return to original rate, and the second time we were not.

The bank is saying that trackers are no longer available and we signed a clear form stating that loan would be SVR at end. By the way, we had a second tracker mortgage with identical terms and conditions also. On that loan, we went fixed for five years ending in Summer 2012, and signing off on the first type of form mentioned above. We were not offered the tracker option last year, complained and got tracker re-instated almost instantly. This mortgage is a little more convoluted, because of two terms on fixed. However, UB have always defined Banks Home Loan Rate to be SVR in all of our complaints, and by conclusion the two forms we signed were the same in meaning.

Any similar stories out there?

Ladylouth

Update on this, three years on. Lost our case with FSO, very disappointed, but we were glad we tried. Today, out of the blue we got a letter saying our case had ben reviewed by UB and we are back on our tracker from tomorrow, bringing our payment down significantly. Further calculations to be done by UB to refund us our losses!!:):):)

decmeister

happy days [a nice holiday perhaps]:D