In February, the bank withdrew a Supreme Court appeal against a High Court decision which upheld a decision of the Financial Services Ombudsman in favour of bank customers. The bank refused to allow certain customers who had switched from a tracker rate mortgage to a fixed rate mortgage for an agreed term to revert to the tracker rate mortgage at the end of that term on the basis that the customers had come off the fixed rate early.
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Deputy McGrath stated: "It is now over two months since PTSB withdrew the Supreme Court appeal and essentially held its hands up on this issue. It is estimated that 2,000 mortgage holders were wrongly denied a tracker rate when they came off their fixed rate and, as a result, ended up paying thousands of euro in additional interest. I have raised this issue in the Dáil with Minister Noonan and directly with the bank. I know that some customers were overcharged tens of thousands of euro in interest as the wrong rate was applied. Some customers have been pursuing this issue for up to five years.
"A number of things now need to happen. The bank needs to contact all the customers affected by this issue and immediately put them on an appropriate tracker rate. The bank needs to repay these customers all the additional interest they were wrongly charged on their mortgage. The customers should also be compensated by the bank for being treated in this manner."
(CD/MH)
