Mortgage Introducer revealed last week that brokers are still experiencing delays in their clients’ applications as a knock-on effect of the online suspension.
The original problem occurred in August during a software update when a fault made the system unavailable for all but buy-to-let cases. As a result MEX was inundated with paper applications and calls, and despite efforts to ease this by extending telephone centre hours, service is still suffering.
Tim Sturley, head of business development at MEX, maintained that the service issues are being dealt with and that up-to-offer-time on cases is unaffected. But a statement on the lender’s website on 12 September read: ‘As paper applications generally take longer to deal with, we have experienced some delays in processing our pipeline cases which has resulted in a higher level of ‘work in progress’.
‘We had hoped to bring the work in progress back to normal levels by the beginning of Sept-ember but it is taking longer than expected. We are taking a number of measures to bring things back to normal as quickly as possible.’
Simon Chalk, mortgage planner at Mortgage Portfolio Services, said taking four or five days to acknowledge receipt of an application was unacceptable. “If I send an application first-class, I expect acknowledgement the next day or within 24 hours but lenders seem to think it is acceptable to sit on paperwork for a few days.
“In times of business strain lenders should relax their criteria, except on money laundering and responsible lending rules, and not be so anal.”
