A statement form the bank said: “Although we acknowledge there is a legitimate market for self-certification mortgages, it has also become apparent that unscrupulous practices are occurring. We would not want to put customers in a position where they cannot honour any loans on their homes.”
The move was criticised by Manchester based mortgage distributor Classic Mortgage Solutions. Managing director, Ray Ronan, said: “I think the real reason may be they weren’t selling enough mortgages and were simply not cut out for the self-cert market.”
Paul Lawler, public relations manager for the Co-operative Bank denied this saying the lender’s self-cert range had been successful and the withdrawal was done for purely ethical reasons.
He said: “We were concerned that some people had approached brokers and lied about their income. At no time were we concerned over the conduct of brokers.”
He went on to deny the withdrawal was a direct result of the recent BBC The Money Programme investigation into the self-cert market.
Richard Griffiths, managing director of Network Data, commented: “Unfortunately self-cert does lend itself to abuse.”
Meanwhile, a computer error recently left 10,000 Co-operative Bank mortgage customers without access to their accounts for a whole day. The bank blamed an input error for the problem.
