Hopefully all your dealings with On Line Mortgages will be positive experiences. However, sometimes things go wrong and if that happens, we have a structured complaints procedure, operated by our network principal, HL Partnership Limited (HLPartnership), to ensure we get things back on track as quickly as possible. This document is a summary of that procedure which is designed to ensure any complaints are dealt with in a professional manner, are handled fairly, effectively and promptly, and are resolved at the earliest possible opportunity.

Our commitment to you…

1. HLPartnership will endeavour to resolve your complaint as quickly as possible and will work within the following timescales:

• Three Business Days – Once your complaint is received, if HLPartnership is able to resolve the matter by close of business on the third working day following its receipt, it will simply do so and advise you in writing with a Summary Resolution Communication.

• Five Business Days – If the matter is not resolved as above, HLPartnership will write to you within five business days acknowledging your complaint, confirming their understanding of the situation, and providing you with the name of the individual handling the complaint.

• Four Weeks – If HLPartnership hasn’t been able to resolve the complaint sooner, after four weeks you will be sent either a Final Response letter (please see below) or a progress report explaining why they are not yet in a position to resolve the complaint.

• Eight Weeks – If HLPartnership still hasn’t been able to resolve the case before hand, at eight weeks they will send you either a Final Response letter (please see below) or an explanation why they are not yet in a position to resolve the complaint, giving the reason for the delay and indicating when they expect to be able to provide a final response.

PLEASE NOTE: A business day is a Monday to Friday between 9am and 5pm, excluding bank holidays. When a complaint is received on a non-business day or on a business day outside business hours, your complaint will be treated as being received on the next business day.

2. HLPartnership will ensure the person dealing with your complaint has the required skill, knowledge and authority to respond to your complaint. Their staff are fully trained and operate a structured and robust complaints procedure to ensure all complaints are dealt with fairly.

3. HLPartnership will ensure the letters it sends are clear and explain things properly. When HLPartnership resolve a complaint, you will either receive:

• Summary Resolution Communication – Where HLPartnership have been able to resolve a complaint within three business days, a Summary Resolution Communication will be sent to you explaining that they believe the complaint to be resolved. This will include details of how to escalate the case if you remain dissatisfied.

• Final Response Letter – Once HLPartnership has completed an investigation, it will issue a Final Response Letter to you. This will detail the complaint, explain the investigation, and confirm the findings. The Final Response letter will either ‘Uphold’ your complaint or ‘Reject’ your complaint and explain why. If there is any settlement or redress awarded, an explanation of how this was calculated will also be included.

As we are part of the HLPartnership network, you will have access to the Financial Ombudsman Service which is a free service set up by Parliament to sort out individual complaints that consumers and financial businesses are not able to resolve themselves.

If, once a Summary Resolution Communication or Final Response Letter has been issued (or after 8 weeks if HLPartnership has yet to issue a Summary Resolution or Final Response letter), you remain dissatisfied with the outcome of their investigations, you may have the right to approach the Financial Ombudsman Service within 6 months of the date of the letter.

If you do not refer your complaint in time, the Ombudsman will not have permission to consider your complaint and so will only be able to do so in very limited circumstances. For example, if the Ombudsman believes that the delay was as a result of exceptional circumstances.

Details of how to get in touch with The Financial Ombudsman Service will be issued with our Summary Resolution and Final Response letters along with a leaflet explaining how the service works. If you require more information, the Financial Ombudsman Service can be contacted as follows:

Address:

Financial Ombudsman Service

Exchange Tower

London

E14 9SR 

Telephone: 0300 123 9123

Website: www.financial-ombudsman.org.uk

Your commitment to us…

In order to help resolve complaints as quickly and fairly as possible, we ask the following:

Tell us what happened – HLPartnership needs to understand the situation as clearly as possible so may ask you to provide your side of the story or request documents and information which may help its investigation. These can be provided by post, email, verbally or through any other means that you prefer.

Help us find the right solution – It is in everyone’s interests to get complaints settled amicably so if there is a particular outcome you believe would be suitable, tell HLPartnership who will assess if this is possible. HLPartnership may not be able to resolve the case the way you would like but can try. And if it cannot, it will explain why it is not possible and offer an alternative solution.

Respond to HLPartnership as soon as you can – Hopefully HLPartnership won’t need to come back to you too often but may need further information or clarity on certain points. If more information is needed, HLPartnership simply ask you to come back to us as soon as you can so that it can get things resolved quicker. If you can’t come back straight away, that’s fine too – just let them know.

Treat us with respect – Whilst it can be frustrating if something’s gone wrong, HLPartnership’s job is to find out what happened and where appropriate, put things right. All staff will do everything they can to help so HLPartnership ask that you give them the time to do their work and treat them with respect.

How to Complain

If you wish to register a complaint, you can do so by contacting the Complaints Department using the following methods:

By post:

The Complaints Department

HL Partnership Limited

By email: complaints@hlpartnership.co.uk 

By telephone: 01903 602 664

By facsimile: 01903 538 852