Warning re HSBC mortgage

[mumof2wildteens]

We've had an offer accepted on a house that we both really love.
HSBC seemed to offer best mortgage, & we bank with them anyway.
Firstly they sent a valuation surveyor from 100 miles away who knows nothing of the local market. I had to really nudge him re the price
Secondly they charged us 180 pounds to not use their Conveyancer, horrible Countrywide. Turns out even after paying that & instructing our own local solicitor they still use them anyway.
CW have been so slow & hopeless that we're months away from exchange & may well lose the property.
I really wish we'd gone with another provider but we've signed the mortgage offer & spent so much.
Sorry to sound doom & gloom but it's so frustrating.

Maples - that's what Hsbc did to us too. And we banked with them for 16 years plus?

We walked straight to Halifax and got it approved - with the added bonus that the repayment was £100 less compared to Hsbc's!!!

THere have been other posts about this. HSBC's name is fast on the way to being mud now in the world of mortgages. I think they'll really start to lose market share soon.

I hope they do.
I so wish we'd known about their reputation before we went down this route.
This nonsense about using Countrywide is awful.

We were turned down because dh went self employed. Ordinarily I would have been fine about it - but the mortgage manager approved it again after we told her. Then the forms went to 'London' and things went wrong after that.

I signed for a mortgage with Hsbc four weeks ago and have had very little in way of progress since, not on system when I rang, unable to speak to mortgage manager as they do not return calls or emails. I've threatened to put in an official complaint twice now and it is the only time they return my call.

I was assured today that HSBC are no slower than any other lender and my application should take 6-8 weeks to complete. I'm not optimistic that it will though and wish I had went elsewhere too. I've never experienced such poor customer service as I have with them.

The first mortgage manager dealing with my application went off on long term sick and the manager that took over also went on the sick.. Makes me wonder what they are like to work for if they treat their customers this poorly.

We got our mortgage with HSBC earlier this year as first time buyers and I think we got away very lightly as there were no problems at all-but I've read appalling reviews of them recently.

6-8 weeks?
Gosh- we've just been approved, was 3 weeks (not HSBC btw)

Not to want to worry you now you've signed but they're hopeless if you get into financial difficulties. I've banked with them for 15 years when dp lost his job. We informed them we may struggle with the mortgage to be told they couldn't offer us any help at all to cope in the short term. We were on the verge of missing mortgage payments :(

Transferred our banking to Lloyds TSB and so far so good. Fingers in ears for negative reports.

We got our mortgage though hsbc too as they offered the best deal at the time. We didn't want to pay to use our own solicitor and so went with one of the Countrywide ones - what a bunch of monkeys! Took four months from our offer being accepted to completion (we were chain free and so was seller's purchase).

CW solicitor (a firm based in the City of London) wasn't professional - didn't return phone calls, asking seller's solicitor questions that had preciously been asked to the point seller's solicitor had to point that out in an email, didn't keep us updated until the end, messed up on a transfer of warranty for the conservatory (build 3 years ago with 10 years warranty, which they should have informed us that warranty isn't transferrable), etc! We are finally in and glad we've got rid of them once and for all!

I have no kind words to say about countrywide. We are currently suffering the same fate. Idiotic fuckers they are.

If it's any consolation to new HSBC mortgage borrowers, my solicitor tells me that as from today the approved conveyancers has increased so CW might be avoidable. Sadly not for those of already engaged with the unprofessional bafoons though.

6-8 weeks is a really long time. Natwest approved our mortgage in 2 weeks. They were really good.

Halifax approved ours on the spot (apparently the mortgage managers in each branch can do that) and the paper work came fairly quickly after!