For the past two and a half years, I’ve maintained a home loan with Corporation Bank. The scheme at the time seemed good and it wasn’t heavy on my pocket. I was on a flexi plan that increases your EMI’s every 5 years in proportion to your salary. However, I realized much later that this meant that interest would keep accumulating and I wasn’t paying anything against the principal amount. The balance loan amount I had at the end of this period was about a lakh and half more than my principal amount and my tenure had increased. I needed to consolidate two other loans and get a top up hence I decided to transfer my loan to **IDBI**. Here starts my story of woes.
It’s almost two months since I applied for this loan. The documents that I was told would be required were available with the representative who contacted me. I’m told that they take just two days to sanction the loan. From my previous experience, I’d learnt that these two days would eventually transpire into 1, or maybe 2 weeks at the most. There was no list of required documents given to me, and I handed them the usual bank statements, salary slips, confirmation letters, Form 16 etc. Two days later I’m informed they need a list of documents copy from Corp Bank. I hand them over the next day. They then ask me for an updated statement of my loans, which again are handed over.
In the meantime, the bosses that supposedly review and sanction the loan were away in some other part of the country. I then was asked ever so randomly about some other document or so that they needed. Every time I asked the representative how long it would take I was told that they were either waiting to do a “telephone verification” or “address verification” or “work verification” post which they would disburse the cheque. This went on for about a month since they would have some new reason or requirement that they would furbish. It took them about a month to finally sanction the loan. Now comes the part of waiting for the disbursement. Almost every time I spoke to the representative I was told” madam, iske clear hone ke baad aapko check disburse kar denge”, “yeh document submit karne ke baad aapko check milega”.
There would be random demands for money at a short notices(they did eventually give me proof for all of this), and then they had a problem with my last name, since I have a different one on my PAN card and different one on my home loan. They said they needed an affidavit to legalize use of both names. It’s a different story altogether that they spelt both my names incorrectly and had no problem using the two new names they’d given me that didn’t match a single document. I was re-christened. Now my home loan is on a name that doesn’t match any name on any of my other documents.
So, now I’ve got a new name, I’ve paid the amount required for processing, I’ve submitted all my documents and I’m told they can’t print the checks out as the blasted franking machines are not working anywhere. Apparently it took them two days to get this fixed. Then the Representative falls ill and says he’s unable to meet me for two days. When he does come around, I’m told that the processing fee that I’d paid is not sufficient and I need to make another DD for the top-up amount and have to arrange for the said amount in a day else they will not release my check. I get that done. And although the DD has been submitted I still haven’t got my top up amount.
The bank seems to have trouble managing expectations. As professionals, it’s imperative they make a list of documents that a person needs to submit along with the amount required for processing fees. They need to set timelines and stick by them. They can’t keep a person hanging for two months waiting for a disbursal of the loan. I was told they were being lackadaisical coz I’m a woman and have no man backing me up or interacting with them. I thought I needed to address this with a superior and spoke to the representative’s boss only to be rudely told that they couldn’t do anything about this and it wasn’t their fault. They made it sound like they’d done me a favor by making the representative collect the documents from me and do all the running around. There was no apology for all the delay from their end and they seemed to think it was acceptable for a loan to take this long to get disbursed. I was told I could do whatever I pleased, complain to whomever, but there was nothing that could be done.
All I wanted was for them to hear me out and set this right. I need to know when my check will be released and what the status is. I need to know why I wasn’t told their requirements in the first place so I could take care of this. I need to know why they don’t equip their employees with sufficient information. You can’t keep telling a person the loan will be sanctioned in a day, two days and stretch it to two months. You can’t randomly keep asking for this document and then that and keep a person hanging. I have commitments too. I’ve been left in a lurch and don’t know what their next demand will be before they finally do release the amount.
Of course, post that, I worry I might have to write another review about how bad their service is once the loan has been disbursed.
Update 27/07/07: Today I get a call saying that the DD has still not cleared. Also if it does show as cleared by noon, the team will forward my papers to the Operations Department. And then it depends on when the Operations dept releases the check for the top up. I had a huge altercation with the representative this morning over this. I’ve been told that they can’t give me a definite date. I was also told that they can’t give me the number for anyone from any other department. Apparently, they’d had an exodus of employees and the new staff is taking time to process loans.(Not a customers fault this!) I then get a call claiming that I have 1659/- overdue. I am told that the check for the home loan transfer was released on the 6th although they’d transferred it to Corp Bank on the 10, hence I’ll need to pay them an interest fee for those four days. Unless I make this payment, they will not release the check for the top up!