Happy belated Christmas everyone!! Hope you all had a great holiday and that you enjoyed the festivities of the season.
The New Year is just around the corner and the Waiting Game continues in the Piglet household although there have been some small but major developments…
Our bank still has not come back to us on the mortgage despite last Wednesday requesting yet more information from us! I know there has been Christmas in between and all of that, but there haven’t been any bank holidays in France since Christmas day was a Saturday so all the banks have been open as usual.
I was absolutely furious when the request came through as the information they requested had already been supplied once, on their mortgage application form and they had acknowledged receipt of it two weeks prior. If they can’t read their goddamn mortgage application form then what hope do we have of getting a mortgage with them or what hope does the world have given that the world’s economic stability depends on these bankers?
Rather more annoyingly is the questions the bank asked do not relate in anyway to whether we can financially afford the mortgage or not. One of the questions was what my maiden name is, another is in which town was I born? What the hell does that have to do with lending me money? Supposedly to do with money laundering but surely they should have this information or have at least checked it out 4 years ago when I opened my account with them and before they initially lent me money for my first mortgage? It’s not as if I’ve just arrived in France and they don’t have any of my banking history! Argghhh! Needless to say the information was in the application form we submitted and also on my passport and my livret de famille so the fact they had to ask this again really does make one wonder…
In fact, I was so wound up that I could not relieve myself of the negative energy within me and I was absolutely gagging for an alcoholic beverage of some description, but now that I’m preggers I daren’t so much as take a sip of anything remotely intoxicating, so instead I took myself out for a walk, chanting away to myself to calm down and found myself in front of the food shops.
I bought the hottest curry paste I could find and all of the parsnips I could get my hands on and came home and made myself the hottest green curry I could possibly stomach and then had the delights of having our baby girl kick my insides until I felt like I had gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson. Probably not the cleverest thing I could have done but the stress and negativity descended and I started to feel more human again.
On Thursday and in much desperation, I called upon the services of a mortgage broker and have not regretted it at all! Our mortgage application was complete by Thursday afternoon and he submitted it to a number of banks on Christmas Eve and by this Monday, we had already received a mortgage agreement in principle. I should have known that this would be the best way to go about things working in finance myself, but I did not have the energy to try and explain our rather bizarre situation to anyone yet alone countless banks – I know how headnumbingly stupid and illogical they can be, especially before the end of the year which is always a busy time for them.
Still no news from our bank though – I haven’t chased them and won’t do so. I want to see just how long they do take to come back to me so that I can tell them where to stick their mortgage, their bank accounts, their insurance policies and their savings accounts when they do. It will be of a great pleasure to me as we have spent a fortune with them in fees and policies over the past few years so it will be a great pleasure for me to tell them to take hike. Maybe they’ll think long and hard about how they should deal with customers, but then again, who am I kidding? Customer service doesn’t exist in France so what the hell?!
So we’ve finally closed one round of the Waiting Game but now the second round has commenced: we have just made an offer on the house (very low) and once again the ball is not in our court. We will just have to wait and see! Hopefully the estate agent will prove to be more professional than our bank!
Oh you are so right about France’s woeful attitude to customer service. I love so much about this country, but this is one aspect where they really need to wake up and take a long, hard look at themselves. I have been fighting a running battle with SFR with regard to cancelling my daughter;s mobile phone contract since August, when she moved back to live in the UK. I was told, categorically, that her contract could be terminated without penalty if I sent a certifcate of scolarity from her UNI, which was done at the beginning of September. I received no reply, so sent another registered letter. The reply arrived, end of September, asking me to send a certifcate of scolarity. Did it again., Registered of course. A reply came asking me to cend a certifcate of scolarity AND a tenancy agreement for her apartment. Another registered letter, both sent. No reply. October, end of, i sent another registered letter asking waht was happening. November, I went to the shop who told me to contact them by email. I did, received a reply promisisng a quick reply…yes, you guessed it, NOTHING>December, son whose French is excellent, spent 4 hours on the phone to SFR. We finally faxed (20 euros cost) all certificates, letters, receipts again as requested. NO RESPONSE. Another hours worth of calls to the SFR Customer ‘care’ line to ascertain that they had actually received the faxes. This has now cost me 3 pointless months mobile fees…160 euros, letters and faxes (50 euros) .Customer service? You decide.
Hah! SFR! Don’t get me started! They are THE WORST! We still cannot make outgoing calls via the Neufbox, 2 months, yes 2 months after installation! I will spare you the details of the shenanigans, but no number of calls to 1077, tweets to @SFR_SAV, posts on their FB page, emails via their contact form, rantings at each ‘téchnicien’ who fails to resolve the issue or threats are working. GAH!!!! I feel so horribly powerless.
Piglet – could you let me have details of the broker that you used? Looks like we may be going down the same route as yourselves and I can’t face doing battle with the Soc Gen and their endless paperwork and fees. Looking forward to hearing how you offer on the house goes!
Hi Penny, we chose Freebox and opted for a special service (for which we pay a bit extra for) called customer service… no, seriously, it’s not a joke, we pay extra for customer service!!! But they work so this confirms to me that customer service does not exist in France!
I will email you the details of the broker. Still no news from the estate agent ref the offer, I think he’s on holiday
OMG! What a nightmare you’re having, unfortunately it sounds oh so familiar I’m afraid to say… keep battling it out, I’m sure you’ll get there in the end although at what expense. One thing though, I think they have to back date if you can prove that you sent the requested information into them.
For info, I had a similar situation with MAAF insurance and it went on for two years… it was such a nightmare!
Best of luck!
Hmmm
“Hopefully the estate agent will prove to be more professional than our bank!”
That’s optimistic!!
PiP
I can always dream can’t I?
Yep…dreams have no bounderies
Good luck! I’m still trying to get my money back from Royal Mail after getting a parcel in my French letterbox that I sent from the UK for my mum in Australia. It seems that the terrible paper-trail and incompetence is spreading over the Channel.
I’m sure the Royal Mail take lessons from La Poste! I used to have endless problems with them when I lived in the UK. Ironically though all the parcels I sent to the UK this year have arrived, the parcels I sent from France to other countries have all gone missing though
Best of luck!
Poor Piglet, The French are nasty sometimes. I think that every person in France has some kind of horror story about getting run over by a large company. The banks are the worst.
Good luck on the owner accepting your offer!!!!
Thanks Dedene! It can all be just so horribly frustrating sometimes… We just tried to speak to our bank again this morning and it seems as if, well, as if they speak a foreign language. Mr Piglet is French so I know it’s not me but we’re just going around in circles with them.
They’ve now asked other questions which are just as daft and Mr P hit the roof and said that they should look at the application and has now registered a complaint – I didn’t want him to tell them to stick it where the sun don’t shine just yet as I’m keen to see what rate they offer (if they offer!). Arggh, its all so frustrating and leaves me feeling so helpless.
Good luck with the offer…I don’t think I have anything left to cross that isn’t already crossed.
Your bank sounds so dreadful…and I’m sure people outside France think we’re a bunch of moaning minnies when we go on and on about the ignorance of the very idea of customer service and doing a job properly…but they have only to come and give it a try!
We’ve just had to go through ‘know your customer’ with out bank here in Costa Rica…thanks to the American taxman putting pressure on Costa Rica to get his sticky hands on lots on unpaid taxes from Americans living there….we and the bank agreed it was all a load of tripe so they rooted out our original forms, we changed the bits that needed changing and that was that.
Thanks Fly, I will be sure to let you know as soon as you can uncross everything!
When I think about my life here I realise how much time I spend moaning about this or that, but it’s true that I spend most of my free time battling against one type of administration or another. It is terribly frustrating and it’s certainly not living the dream, I would never move to France to do that and didn’t expect to live it when I moved here. But at times like at the moment when I am willing to do anything to move mountains and ensure I don’t end up living with my in-laws it all just gets so darn frustrating that I end up in tears. Its no different for the average French person except most of them don’t know any better so they just accept and move on…
I can only imagine the types of forms and ID you have to supply when complying with Amercian legislation for the banks – its the same here in France if an American wishes to open an account. They have a lot more forms to complete that us Brits! It sounds as if you have a helpful, sensible bank manager, maybe Costa Rica can export some to France?
BNPain in the butt? At least it sounds like them…we are so ready to ditch the big French bank for a smaller, cheaper one.
Hope it all works out soon.
no, not BNPain, or CIC but another 3 letter bank very regional to Lyon LOL!
I have experienced BNP, CIC and SocGen all in the past so am with you on wanting to ditch the big French bank now. It’s such a shame as our first 3 years with our current bank were great, we had a fantastic bank manager but now we have a slob. Like so many things it depends on who you get…
What bank would you consider switching to?
I hope all works out. Sorry about how difficult things are in Europe with such given situations. We just locked in our morgage yesterday for our new house at 4.85 . We close on our house in 60 days.
What fantastic news for you Kelleyn, you must be delighted!
We know our bank are offering a VERY low rate currently (under 3%) as we have already managed to get the commercial terms of the mortgage agreed but the offer we have from the other bank is a bit higher which is why I am still so keen to here back from them. As we haven’t heard back from the owners yet we’re still in limbo so I can keep hoping…
How lovely it would be though to know that we could complete in 60 days… given your situation that’s so fantastic!
The only thing I know currentt is that we move out in 6 weeks and will be homeless…
Well there will be a certain amount of satisfaction in being able to tell the bank where to stick their appalling service. I hope you have everything sorted very soon.
(I think a small glass of wine occasionally is OK isn’t it?)
Hi Ayak, for the wine I have heard contradicting stories which have left me in great doubt and too scared to risk even having the slightest sip. I would also be scared that once I started I wouldn’t be able to stop which sounds really bad but I’m craving wine so much right now I’m sure I’d have a “one more surely can’t hurt” attitude.
I am longing to tell the bank to bog off, the day is coming very soon!
OK, I will spare you the misery of reading about the red tape, ridiculousness of buying property in Argentina.
We were sort of able to bypass a lot of the people you have to deal with, all real estate here is paid for in cash. So there are other issues to deal with and they do love their stamps and signatures here, but it is probably not as bad as France.
The bad thing here is the taxes. They tax you on everything . Every.thing.
Plus you have to protect yourself because you are dealing in cash in a country/city where they still have armed bank robberies…too many for my peace of mind.
So you hire a man who will carry the cash out of the place where you do business and or pay the people who will wire it out of the country or wherever and pay more taxes for doing so.
Sick isn’t it ? How hard “they” make it for just every day people to buy a home and be happy ?
Hi Candice,
Thanks for trying to make me feel better! The taxes are on pretty much everything in France also, its a nightmare! But I cannot imagine having to hire a man to carry the money when buying a property and stuff – MY GOODNESS!! I don’t know if I would be able to cope I would be so scared all the time! Well done you for coping so well!
Oh poor you. I keep my fingers crossed for you guys that you manage to get the mortgage for the house of your dreams!! xx
So here we are: Monday. First business day past the holidays. I truly hope that things will start to roll and move in a positive direction! Your story and the SFR story in comments have me freaked out, wondering what I am doing in a place where customer service is so abysmal! *le sigh* Okay, so maybe the healthcare system makes up a bit for the other shite, eh?
In any case, besides the horror of the molasses (“treacle” in the UK?) through which people have to trudge to get anything done, the thing that truly got me giggling in this post was this:
“I bought the hottest curry paste I could find and all of the parsnips I could get my hands on and came home and made myself the hottest green curry I could possibly stomach and then had the delights of having our baby girl kick my insides until I felt like I had gone ten rounds with Mike Tyson.”
Hahaha! Oh girlfriend, what WERE you thinking!? Too hilarious. Anyone who has been preggers knows exactly this whole situation! You crack me up.
But, I will have to remember curry as a sub for alcohol in the future. I bet the urge to smoke probably had you going, too, huh, lol! You poor dear! Maybe try a hot shower next time, and whatever you do, DO NOT do the curry treatment in the 3rd trimester!! Trust me!!
Be well, dear Piglet, and I will hope for some good news on all this very soon.
(Which you may already have had. I came here via an old Yahoo/Twitter alert I saw on my Yahoo homepage!)
Take care.