h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

I am now working for a bank selling mortgages to people who call in. These are sometimes direct customers, but usually independant financial advisors (IFAs)

I am only just out of training and still not fully up to speed and therefore have several people nearby who can help me.

I got a call from a female IFA asking if she could take an application to approval (basically the bank saying that in principle we are willing to lend you this amount of money)

I went through the system, and stopped at the most important part. The Mortgage screen shows how much the property is and how much the customer wants. I went past it as it was already complete, this then performs a credit check and goes to the illustration page, where they select exactly what kind of mortgage they want (discount, fixed, etc).

It was set at £60,000 loan and I asked if this was correct.

The IFA said: No, they only need £59,000.

Great I thought, nice and easy.

I went back to the mortgage screen and noticed that it was only asking for £55,000. This meant it had been illustrated for £5000 more than they had asked for. I changed it to £59,000 and went through another credit search.

Yup, you guessed it. It was declined. So I told the IFA and said I would refer this to the underwriters.

"That's not good enough" she said. "We need to put an offer in fairly soon."

My manager told me to put her on hold and said I should physically go to the underwriters ( a few metres away) and talk to them.

I promised to call the IFA back ASAP and did so. They told me they would work on it straight away, but didn't know how long it would take.

I called the IFA back.

"How long will it take?"

"I don't know, but they are working on it RIGHT NOW."

"Yes, but how long will it take?"

"I don't know."

"But they need to put an offer in by the end of business today. They're sitting with me now."

That's 16:30 and it was 15:15.

I promised to go back and hurry them up.

Anyway, long story short, the underwriter brought it back up to me herself, but I was on another call. This was only 20 mins after my call.

A friend of mine called the IFA back and went all the way through the application until he asked:

"Can I have the bank details for paying the mortgage and for the monthly payments."

Whereupon he was told

"I don't have them."


(all together now...)

OH FOR THE LOVE OF - - - -!