Nationwide Building Society · DRN-6228427

The complaint Mr D complains about the length of time it took Nationwide Building Society to deal with his application to move a joint mortgage into his sole name. This took many months and Mr D pointed to a number of mistakes Nationwide had made. Mr D said this affected his health. What happened Mr D previously had a joint mortgage with his ex-partner, held with Nationwide. He wanted to move this mortgage into his sole name, after this relationship ended. Mr D told us that this process took over 10 months, and during this time he experienced prolonged delays, serious communication failures, and critical errors. Mr D said he’d told Nationwide that he was a vulnerable customer, but it failed to take this into account, causing a deterioration in his mental health which was so significant it also impacted his partner’s health. Mr D said Nationwide had offered him £600 compensation, but he didn’t think that reflected the emotional harm, risk, and negligence in this case. He said Nationwide had downplayed the impact this had on him, and the risks its errors caused. He wanted our service to review his case. Nationwide said that it had broken Mr D’s complaint down into three areas – 1. The length of time the application took – offering £150 2. The level of communication from Nationwide throughout the application – offering £200 3. The mortgage application uploaded to Mr D’s solicitor’s portal as complete, although it was not – offering £250. Nationwide said it could see that Mr D’s application took almost a year to complete, but it said that Mr D did change his solicitors, and he had taken out a new Buy To Let (“BTL”) application while his Transfer of Equity (“ToE”) application was being considered by it. But that didn’t cover all the time that Nationwide had been considering the application, and it accepted it had made what it referred to as “many errors” during this time, which Mr D couldn’t have done anything about. Nationwide said Mr D sent multiple emails trying to schedule the appointment for his mortgage application. Then he received repeated emails asking for the same information, which he had already sent. Mr D tried to keep in touch with Nationwide, but it didn’t respond to those attempts properly. It told him his application would result in an offer in a matter of days, but Mr D was still chasing this almost two weeks later. Nationwide also accepted the solicitors’ portal was updated with incorrect information, telling Mr D’s solicitor that this application had all been completed and approved. Mr D checked, and it hadn’t.

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Nationwide said it wanted to apologise, and pay Mr D £600 in compensation. It said it would also consider payment of any direct costs he’d incurred. Our investigator said Nationwide had clearly made a number of mistakes here, but he thought it had provided a fair offer to put things right. She said he first contacted Nationwide in August 2024, but had to chase through September and October for an appointment. Nationwide accepts there were delays at this stage, which was poor service. Nationwide requested supporting documents in October, then asked for them again after they were provided, which again was poor service. Nationwide issued a mortgage offer in December 2024. Mr D then told Nationwide there was a change of solicitors. Nationwide says in these circumstances it would write to the new solicitor to confirm they are acting, and to the old solicitor to check they aren’t acting. Our investigator thought this was reasonable, but the required confirmation from the new solicitors wasn’t received until mid-April. The letter was dated 16 April 2025. Nationwide couldn’t move things forward before it got that. Our investigator said it was reasonable for Nationwide to wait for solicitor’s confirmation before continuing Mr D’s application. Nationwide then reviewed Mr D’s application, and found that Mr D had taken out an additional BTL mortgage after the offer was issued. Nationwide reassessed affordability, which our investigator said it was entitled to do. Nationwide asked for further information, but as part of this, it wanted to see three months of rental income for Mr D’s new property. And he didn’t have that, so Nationwide said it couldn’t go ahead with his ToE application. Our investigator said she understood this would be very upsetting for Mr D, but she thought that was fair and reasonable given the change in circumstances. Shortly after this, Nationwide incorrectly marked the mortgage as completed on the solicitor portal. Nationwide accepted this was an error and poor service, and our investigator said this caused Mr D significant stress. Fortunately, Mr D uncovered the mistake before any legal or financial loss occurred. Mr D appealed, and Nationwide said it agreed to go outside of policy and approved the application in early June 2025. So our investigator said that Nationwide did ultimately take steps to resolve the matter and progress the lending. Our investigator acknowledged what Mr D had told us about the impact this process had on him, but she said not all of the delays were caused by Nationwide. A lengthy delay happened while Nationwide was waiting for the previous and the new solicitor’s confirmation, and then Nationwide did need to reassess affordability in April 2025 when it found Mr D had a new mortgage. Those delays weren’t the result of poor service by Nationwide. Our investigator said considering not all the issues here were Nationwide’s fault, she didn’t think it would be fair to require Nationwide to pay more than its offer of £600. Mr D replied to disagree. He wanted to check what we had understood happened. Mr D said he didn’t change solicitors, he’d given the name and address of his solicitor, but Nationwide had named the wrong solicitor on his offer. Mr D said he then got in touch, and because his usual solicitors didn’t do conveyancing, gave Nationwide the name of the firm that did. Mr D said if Nationwide had named the right solicitor, his solicitor would have received the letter sooner and been able to act on changing it sooner. And he assumed that at least some of the delay was while Nationwide was waiting for the wrong solicitor to confirm they were no

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longer acting, when they never had acted for him. Mr D said that Nationwide also didn’t seem to have chased this, in over 2 months. Mr D also said he didn’t think Nationwide had gone outside of policy to lend to him, he thought he’d jumped through hoops to meet its requirements. Mr D thought that once he provided three months rental income evidence for his new property, he ought to have been back within Nationwide’s lending criteria. Mr D said that this had all impacted the health of him and his partner. He provided details, and said we shouldn’t dismiss this. Mr D said the error on the solicitor’s portal nearly caused serious problems, and Nationwide should be treated the same as if those problems had occurred. Mr D also wanted us to consider that while Nationwide was telling him it couldn’t lend to him, it was also sending him direct mailings, saying he was pre-qualified for a £10,000 loan. Mr D said that Nationwide’s practice appears to prioritise profit over customer support, and he thought it was deeply inappropriate. Nationwide said it thought the mistake over the solicitors happened because Mr D’s usual solicitor and the one it had named shared the same postcode. And it confirmed that Mr D’s mortgage had not passed its affordability criteria, but it had been approved following manual underwriting. Nationwide also said that there are very different lending criteria for secured and unsecured lending. Our investigator wrote again, to say she accepted that the solicitor’s name on the offer is not the one Mr D had intended, but the subsequent delay still didn’t seem to be Nationwide’s fault. And she said Nationwide wasn’t waiting for the letter from the old conveyancer, it was waiting for the letter from the new conveyancers which was finally received in mid-April 2025. Our investigator didn’t think it was unreasonable for Nationwide to be communicating with the conveyancer about this. Our investigator said when we look at the mistake on the solicitors portal, we must consider what did happen, and the issue was identified and corrected. And she didn’t think Nationwide sending out a loan promotion mailing amounted to inappropriate or unfair conduct. She understood the whole application had been stressful, but still thought it wouldn’t be fair and reasonable to require Nationwide to increase the compensation. Mr C wrote again. He said Nationwide had accepted it didn’t properly record the full name and address of the law firm he’d given. And that meant the wrong firm got his offer. That shouldn’t have happened, and Mr D wanted Nationwide to show us more information to establish when it tried to contact the new conveyancers, and whether it had written to the old firm once Mr D had told it about this mistake. He said that his conveyancers had been trying to arrange completion in early April, so what Nationwide said didn’t fit with this. Mr D said he accepted Nationwide was entitled to reassess affordability once he’d taken out an additional BTL mortgage. But he said it didn’t explain what had changed, why his application no longer met its criteria, and what precise threshold he needed to meet to resolve the issue. Mr D said that uncertainty made things worse. Mr D said he wanted us to appreciate the stress of discovering that Nationwide had told his solicitor the mortgage was in his name, and funds could be released to his ex-partner, when the mortgage hadn’t been changed. And he still thought it was highly inappropriate for Nationwide to be offering him a personal loan when it was also asking him to make overpayments to his mortgage.

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Our investigator spoke to Nationwide again, and it confirmed that Mr D’s conveyancers were sent the mortgage offer on 27 January 2025. So our investigator said the delay between then and April wasn’t Nationwide’s fault. And by the time those conveyancers replied to Nationwide, Mr D had another mortgage, so Nationwide needed to reassess his application. Lenders don’t have to provide applicants with a detailed breakdown of every internal consideration beyond explaining that lending criteria were not met. She understood Mr D’s strength of feeling, but she hadn’t changed her mind. Because no agreement was reached, this case then came to me for a final decision. What I’ve decided – and why I’ve considered all the available evidence and arguments to decide what’s fair and reasonable in the circumstances of this complaint. I’ve reached the same overall conclusion on this complaint as our investigator. A number of things have gone wrong on Mr D’s mortgage application. As this has already been discussed between our investigator and Mr D, I’ll confine myself to setting out the headline points, then saying how I think those impact the decision in this case. Mr D first contacted Nationwide in late August 2024. Mr D’s initial enquiry should have led to an application appointment. Mr D chased for this repeatedly, but didn’t get it. It looks like this was a result of an internal IT problem which Nationwide’s staff member didn’t act to resolve. This meant Mr D didn’t have his application appointment until mid-October 2024, and this delay is clearly Nationwide’s fault. Mr D had a low existing mortgage interest rate with Nationwide, which he wanted to keep. Otherwise he may have pursued a remortgage elsewhere. Once Mr D had his appointment, and his mortgage application was finally moving forward, Mr D then submitted documents. He was then asked again for those he’d already sent. In the context of an application which was already off to a poor start, this was unfortunate. It also looks as if Mr D was then asked for information which could have been requested earlier, such as proof of the funds he was using for the buyout. At the same time, a mistake was made over Mr D’s solicitor. Mr D said he gave Nationwide the full name and address of the solicitor acting for him, but I’ve listened to the relevant call, and Mr D was only asked for the postcode. The advisor didn’t check the firm name with him, which is where the error crept in. I do think this was Nationwide’s fault. However, I think the issue of the mortgage offer to a firm of solicitors at the same address as the firm Mr D uses, is unlikely to have resulted in serious harm to Mr D. And I also think that, because the firm Mr D intended to name didn’t do conveyancing, Nationwide would still have needed to write to the firm who actually did the work, to confirm they were acting. So this error didn’t cause additional delay. Nationwide told us it wrote to the new firm, of conveyancers, in late January. Its notes say the firm called on 15 April and then wrote to Nationwide, with a letter dated 16 April. There’s nothing I’ve seen in the evidence from either side, to suggest this firm tried to contact Nationwide before this. Although Mr D has shown us he was very proactive in contacting Nationwide at other times, he didn’t speak to it during this period either. I do think this delay between January and April impacted Mr D, and caused at least some of the stress and frustration he later felt. But I don’t think this delay is Nationwide’s fault. Nationwide then reviewed Mr D’s mortgage application, and discovered he’d taken out a new

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BTL mortgage since his offer was made. The offer Nationwide sent Mr D says “We are committed to making this loan before the offer expires unless: • there is a material change in your personal or financial circumstances.” I’m satisfied that there had been a material change in Mr D’s circumstances, and Nationwide was entitled to reconsider whether it wanted to make an offer. If Mr D hadn’t realised that a commitment to pay a new BTL mortgage would trigger Nationwide reconsidering, and potentially withdrawing, its offer to put the mortgage for his home into his sole name, then I don’t think that’s Nationwide’s fault. I think that Nationwide withdrawing Mr D’s offer at this stage is likely to be the cause of much of the stress Mr D then felt. But this isn’t something Nationwide got wrong. Mr D asked Nationwide to reconsider his application, but he didn’t have evidence of rent payments across three months that Nationwide asked for. Nationwide rejected his application, although again there appears to have been a considerable amount of internal confusion here, and it doesn’t look like Mr D had been told, by 22 May, that his appeal had been rejected a week earlier. Mr D rang Nationwide on 22 May, because his solicitors had been told the transfer was complete. It is fortunate that Mr D checked, as the transfer wasn’t complete, and Nationwide didn’t think it was going to be able to transfer the mortgage to his sole name, at this point. Our service can’t do what Mr D would like, and hold Nationwide responsible for this mistake in the same way we would do if Mr D hadn’t identified the error. But we can take account of the additional stress this would cause, and I have done so in reaching my conclusions below. After a number of further calls, during which Mr D explained the impact this was now having on his mental health, Mr D’s ToE application finally received a fresh offer, and the transfer of the mortgage into his sole name was actioned. Mr D says that during this time, Nationwide was also writing to him to say that he was “pre- approved” for a sizable personal loan. Mr D feels this added insult to injury, as he was simultaneously being told that Nationwide wouldn’t let him take on the mortgage he was already paying. I understand why Mr D would feel frustrated by this, but Nationwide has explained the different lending criteria for personal loans and mortgages. And I don’t think it’s unfair or unreasonable for Nationwide to provide Mr D with marketing materials, if he has agreed to receive those. It’s open to Mr D to request that direct marketing mailings cease in future. Once Mr D’s mortgage was finally moved into his sole name, Mr D complained. Nationwide offered him £600, which he said wasn’t anywhere near enough for what had happened. I understand Mr D has had a very upsetting experience, and I’ve considered all he has told us about his disclosed vulnerability and how this application impacted him. I’ve also listened to the calls he had with Nationwide, so I can hear that, particularly in the final stages of this application, its agents also recognised the impact all this was having on him. Some of that impact clearly is Nationwide’s fault, and I have flagged what I consider to be several examples of very poor service in the history of this application. But there are two factors which make me think that, despite having let Mr D down at points, Nationwide has now provided a fair and reasonable outcome here. The first is that some of the most stressful events in this case, were not Nationwide’s fault.

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Nationwide didn’t cause the lengthy delay between January and April 2025. And, importantly, it isn’t responsible for Mr D taking out a new BTL mortgage elsewhere in this period, which meant his previous offer was withdrawn. The second, and I think most important, factor is that Nationwide did give Mr D the lending he wanted. Nationwide had said it wouldn’t lend to Mr D once he had an additional BTL mortgage, and I can see internal notes confirming that although the property then rented out and Mr D had received the required three months of rent paid upfront, his application had then been reassessed and was still declined in mid-May. Nationwide told Mr D on 3 June that his application had been picked up for a quality check. It had been reopened and Nationwide reassessed his case, taking into account the full background. That’s when Nationwide decided it would allow Mr D to transfer this lending into his sole name. I know that Mr D considers his application was always low-risk for Nationwide, and I’ve also taken into account that he was already paying this mortgage by himself. But Nationwide has been clear that Mr D didn’t meet its lending criteria once he had that additional BTL property. And our service doesn’t often overturn the assessment of risk that a lender makes. When I consider this case, I have to determine the complaint “… by reference to what is, in [my] opinion, fair and reasonable in all the circumstances of the case.” And the fact that Nationwide stepped outside of its usual lending policy to bring Mr D’s application to a successful conclusion, is one of those circumstances. So I have to bear this in mind when I’m considering whether Nationwide has done enough to put things right. In this context, I do think the offer Nationwide has made here, provides a fair and reasonable outcome to this complaint. It’s not clear whether Nationwide has paid the £600 it offered, so I will ask it to do so now, if it hasn’t already. My final decision My final decision is that Nationwide must pay Mr D the sum of £600 which it previously offered, if it hasn’t done so already. Under the rules of the Financial Ombudsman Service, I’m required to ask Mr D to accept or reject my decision before 24 April 2026. Esther Absalom-Gough Ombudsman

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