The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has reported that in August, gross mortgage lending by the UK’s High Street banks followed a similar pattern to earlier months of the year. Net lending (gross lending with repayments and redemptions stripped out) returned to trend, increasing by £2.8 billion, compared to a rise of £1.9 billion in July. [...]
For the first time ever, the Financial Services Authority (FSA) has published figures showing the number of complaints made to firms in the financial services industry in the 2006-2008 period. The data has revealed an enormous increase in complaints about banking and loan products, revealing a 122% increase – from 608,620 at the beginning of [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has produced July mortgage approval figures for the UK’s High Street lenders, showing approvals for house purchases up 7.4% on a month earlier, to 38,181. The figure has now risen for the seventh consecutive month. However, while both the number of mortgage approvals and the amount of new lending increased, [...]
Latest figures from the British Bankers’ Association show a “modest” increase in net mortgage lending. UK banks lent a net £2.6 billion in June, compared with £2.4 billion in May and a previous six month average of £3.1 billion. In terms of volumes, last month saw 35,235 loans approved for house purchases, up from 31,919 [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has published its latest mortgage lending statistics showing that in May, the number of loans approved for house purchases rose to 31,162. The figure is up from 29,018 in April and sports an increase of 15.8% on May 2008. However, gross lending fell to £7.7 billion last month, a figure [...]
According to the British Bankers’ Association (BBA), the number of mortgages approved for house purchases rose by 4% in April compared with the previous month, rising from 26,671 to 27,685 approvals. However, compared with April 2008, this represented a fall of 15.5%. Furthermore, net new mortgage lending (which takes into account repayments and redemptions) hit [...]
New figures from the British Bankers’ Association (BBA) show mortgage approvals for house purchases falling by 7% in March. The decline follows three consecutive months in the level had increased. The Association’s members approved 26,097 new home loans last month, down from 28,024 in February and trailing 25% behind March 2008 numbers. More positively, last [...]
Figures from the British Bankers’ Association (BBA) show a rise in the number of mortgages approved for house purchase in February, signalling the third consecutive monthly increase. Last month 28,179 loans for house purchases were sanctioned, up from 24,278 in January and significantly ahead of November’s record low rate of 17,878. However, February’s figure is [...]
A ruling by the court of appeal could see millions of pounds returned to customers after the case of unauthorised overdraft charges was thrown out. The ruling follows a test case last year between the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) and eight High Street Banks with regard to charges for unauthorised borrowing and bounced cheques, [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has reported a slight rise in the number of mortgages approved by its members for house purchases, in January. By volume, approvals rose to 23,376, compared to 22,416 in December, however, the figure was still 43% down on a year earlier. According to the BBA, High Street banks are currently [...]
An online tool that enables savers to locate forgotten or lost bank accounts is proving popular with Brits, according to National Savings and Investments (NS&I). Launched in January 2008 by the NS&I in conjunction with the Building Societies Association (BSA) and the British Bankers’ Association (BBA), mylostaccount.org.uk has received 180,000 applications to search for lost [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has reported that lending for house purchases fell by 52% during 2008. However, in December the Association’s members approved 22,000 home loans, up from 17,000 a month earlier, although still down 47% on December 2007. The BBA is cautious about the monthly rise, suggesting that it does not indicate a [...]
Figures from the Office for National Statistics have revealed that the UK economy contracted faster between the third quarter of the year than originally thought. Previous estimates showed that there had been a contraction of 0.5%, however the figure was actually 0.6% during the July and September period. The previous quarter was left unrevised at [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has reported that UK mortgage lending fell sharply in November. Approvals for house purchases were down 14% on October and 60% year-on-year, to a record low of 17,773. The average amount borrowed was £117,000, down nearly 24% on November 2007. Meanwhile, remortgaging approvals fell in volume to 29,798, compared with [...]
The British Bankers’ Association has published figures for mortgage lending in October, showing a monthly 3% rise in the total value of mortgage approvals, to £11.9 billion. Total lending was, however, 38.2% lower than during October of last year. The number of mortgages approved for house purchases declined in volume to 21,584, down from 23,383 [...]
Chancellor Alistair Darling is bracing himself to battle with the banks after the £37 billion bailout package for three UK banks has failed to kick-start lending. Mr Darling is considering tough new laws to force banks to lend to small businesses, in particular those who are still feeling the effects of the banking crisis and [...]
Latest figures from the British Bankers’ Association (BBA) show that the number of mortgages approved for house purchases rose slightly during September. According to the seasonally adjusted data 23,422 loans were sanctioned by Britain’s banks and building societies, 10% more than in August (when approvals hit a record low of 21,342) but 57% fewer than [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has reported a 64% annual decline in mortgage approvals for house purchases, in August. In all, 21,086 new home loans were sanctioned during the month, compared with 58,564 in August 2007. The figure is 5% down on July 2008 and at its lowest since BBA records began in 1997. August [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has released data on lending for July, showing that 22,448 mortgages were approved during the month. The figure is slightly ahead of June’s when 22,369 home loan applications were successful but represents a 65% decline on July 2007. It is also well below the average for the six months to [...]
The British Bankers’ Association (BBA) has released figures for mortgage lending in June, showing that the number of new home loans approved by the UK’s leading lenders fell 23% in a month. In May, BBA members approved 27,499 new home loans but the figure declined to 21,118 in June, representing a 66.9% fall on the [...]
Phone fraudsters stealing bank card pins
Fraudsters using a phone scam to trick bank card holders into revealing their pin numbers stole £750,000 in the first four months of this year. This is the same amount stolen through this scam in the whole of last year. The fraudster telephones a bank customer, often someone elderly or vulnerable, telling them that their [...]
FSA rules out ban on interest-only mortgages
Speculation that the Financial Services Authority would ban interest-only mortgages as part of its Mortgage Market Review has proved to be unfounded. However, lenders will be required to monitor the performance of the investment product taken out by the customer to repay the mortgage at the end of its term. Investments are performing poorly because [...]
Bank of England may end free in-credit banking
A director of the Bank of England has warned that official intervention could be considered to end the ‘dangerous myth of free in-credit banking’. Andrew Bailey has already spoken out against free banking in relation to the mis-selling of financial products. In a speech made available to media, he reiterated his concern, saying that it [...]
Bank of England votes against more economic stimulus
The Bank of England voted against a further round of quantitative easing, at its latest Monetary Policy Committee (MPC) meeting. Just one member, David Miles, voted for further asset purchase to encourage growth in the UK economy, while the other eight members voted to keep the Bank’s quantitative easing programme steady at £325bn. The minutes [...]
Catalogue debt growing says helpline
Calls from people concerned about their debts with mail order catalogues accounted for more than 12 per cent of all calls received by National Debtline last year, compared with just 8 per cent in 2007. More people were concerned about catalogue debt than about payday loans, mortgage or rent, according to the Money Advice Trust [...]
Homeserve faces mis-selling investigation
HomeServe, which provides emergency insurance cover and domestic repairs to households in the UK, is to be investigated by the Financial Services Authority (FSA). Issues over the possible mis-selling of household emergency policies were uncovered last October during an internal review at the Walsall-based company. Homeserve’s call centre staff were found to be selling ‘Complete [...]
OFT warns Wonga over debt collection methods
Payday loan company Wonga used aggressive and misleading methods to collect debts from customers, the Office of Fair Trading (OFT) has found. Wonga sent letter and emails to certain customers suggesting they had committed fraud and threatening to report them to the police if they did not act in the way Wonga suggested. The company [...]
NS&I re-launches investment account
National Savings & Investments (NS&I) has re-launched its Investment Account at a higher interest rate than it previously offered. The account now offers 0.75 per cent before tax, compared with between 0.2 and 0.3 per cent previously, depending on the account balance. Deposits and withdrawals on the account can no longer be made at Post [...]
Rightmove reports property downsizing trend
Two in five property owners planning to sell in the next year are planning to ‘trade down’, compared with one in four who plan to ‘trade up’. A survey by property website Rightmove found that moving to a smaller home is the main reason for moving in nine out of the ten regions in the [...]
More people failing to save for retirement
The proportion of people with no pension savings has grown from 20 per cent to 22 per cent over the past year, according to Scottish Widows’ latest survey. The pension provider surveyed 5,200 adults in the UK, aged 30 or over, and earning at least £10,000 a year, for its annual review of pensions. Ian [...]
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