Mortgage Payment Difficulties
Please talk to us
When you are experiencing financial difficulties, it can be tempting to ignore the problem and try to carry on as normal. However, it is essential that you talk to us as soon as you can - even if you haven't yet missed a mortgage payment. You are not alone - thousands of mortgage borrowers get help from their lender every year.
The best place to start is by making contact with our friendly team 0800 783 2367 and filling us in on what’s been happening. You can also contact us by email at customersupport@teachersbs.co.uk. Our expert team have many years of experience and you won’t be the first person who has needed to ask for support. In fact, it’s what we’re here for. Just talking to us about your options will not impact your credit score.
When you contact us you will get straight through to a friendly, experienced member of our team who will chat to you about your current circumstances. This is an informal discussion to help us gain a better understanding of your situation and, most importantly, what we can do to help.
We may also ask you to complete a budget planner, to help us better understand your monthly outgoings, because the more we understand the more appropriate the solution we can offer. We will try to support you based on your needs and what you can afford to pay. We are signed up to the Mortgage Charter so that we can offer flexible, short-term support if you are finding it difficult to make your mortgage payments - click here to find out more.
Please note for joint mortgage account customers, we will require consent from both account holders before we can proceed with the options below.
Reviewing your options
There may be different options available to you, to help you if you believe you are going to experience difficulties paying your mortgage. These are as follows:
If you currently have a repayment mortgage, which means you are paying capital and interest every month, we can change your mortgage to interest only for a period of 6 months. This will reduce your monthly mortgage payments and will not have an impact on your credit file as long as you have not already missed a payment.
Please remember that when the interest only period comes to an end, we will change your mortgage back to repayment. We will then recalculate your mortgage payments based on what term you have left on your mortgage at that time. As you will not have paid any of the capital back to us over the preceding 6 months, this will mean that you mortgage payments will go up.
We may be able to increase the term of your mortgage, which will reduce your monthly mortgage payments (if you have a repayment mortgage). You are allowed to increase the term up to your stated retirement age (maximum age 70). For joint mortgage account holders, we base this on the account holder that is due to retire first.
This will not have an impact on your credit file and if you find yourself in a better financial position later on, we will let you reduce your mortgage term again in the future without any affordability checks.
Please remember that extending the term of your mortgage, means that it will take you longer to pay back your mortgage and you will pay more interest overall.
You may find it easier if we changed your payment date for you. For example, if you currently pay on the 3rd of every month, we could change this to the 15th or the 28th of every month, which may be more suitable for you taking into consideration the date you receive your salary.
Please remember that if you decide to change it to a date earlier in the month, there will be a shorter time frame between your two mortgage payments. For example, if you last paid your mortgage on the 28th of June and now wish to change to the 3rd of the month, you will be expected to make your next payment on the 3rd of July.
Changing the date of your payment or how you make your payment will not have an impact on your credit file.
If the options above are not suitable, you may be able to take a break from making your mortgage payments for a short period of time. We call this a payment holiday.
Please remember that your payments will increase when you start paying your mortgage again, as you will not have paid any of your mortgage back and you will continue to accrue interest when you don’t pay your mortgage.
We will need to make sure that the increased mortgage payments after the payment holiday are affordable for you.
Please note that we are required to inform the credit reference agencies if you take a payment holiday which can impact on your ability to obtain credit in the future.
What you need to do next
If you wish to discuss your options in more detail, please email customersupport@teachersbs.co.uk or telephone 0800 783 2367 (Option 2).
Having decided upon a course of action, we will work together to monitor your account, keeping in touch with you to see if your financial position has changed. We will also contact you if we notice that the terms of any arrangement have been broken, or if you are nearing the end of your arrangement.
If your situation changes in any way, please contact us to let us know so we can make sure that the options we have agreed regarding your mortgage account are still appropriate.
If your mortgage is already in arrears
If you have already missed one or more mortgage payments, please speak to us as soon as possible. We will discuss the options available to you. Please note that if you are already in arears this will affect your credit file and may affect your ability to obtain credit in the future.