I'm outraged how the banks behave in this country - does anybody regulate their behaviour and hold them accountable? - they are unethical and disgusting.

I picked Standard Chartered Bank because as a 'western' bank I expected a more civilised service. Instead they are just as bad as everyone else!

1) Notification
I'm pretty sure its illegal to change your repayments with letting you know but SCB did it anyway. They changed my monthly payment with NO NOTICE. Only when I complained did they send me a letter - four months after - advising me of a retroactive change.

Its not my primary account - i have standing orders going in. Lucky I have extra else i would have defaulted and god only knows what would have happened in this country.

Likely Conversation at SCB Consumer Finance Dubai

Senior
"Times are bad we need more profits hmm - lets scr*w our borrowers, this is dubai and we cab do whatever the h*ll we want, lets just take it from these guys who are trapped with us due to high prepayment penalties and massive negative equity"

junior
"should we let them know sir? isn't that bad service, irresponsible and maybe even illegal"

Senior
"No, forget it - this isn't the UK, The regulator won't even notice and even if they do - who cares about the little guy - just deduct the money tomorrow, these expats can afford it"


2) Unethical / Usurious

So the next bit is legal, but only because the regulator has not got its act together. So While my mortgage was EIBOR+3% with a 6m reset. They sent me a letter saying its a crisis so we going to change you from EIBOR to our own internal rate (higher) and by the way we're going to keep you there for12mths!!!

Oh small print actually says we can tear up all the terms and do whatever we want. They are right but you don't have much choice all lenders are the same - you want to buy a house - we give you no choice and the regulator doesn't care/

OUTRAGEOUS. Just as EIBOR starts to fall - they change my mortgage to fleece me as much as they can.


Likely Conversation at SCB Consumer Finance Dubai

Senior
"We've completely mismanaged our bank funding and are making less profit - what do we do? Hmm - do we have some captive borrowers we can rob? - what about those trapped negative equity guys from before"

Junior
"But sir we've already passed on the EIBOR spike for the next six months"

Senior
"Hmm but EIBOR is dropping now that UAE Central Bank is taking action (like USA) to ease the crunch and improve things for the people - perhaps we can use this for extra profit"

Junior
"but sir thats not very ethical or fair"

Senior
"This is UAE banking you cretin, we can do what we want here, look at the discretionary change on loans from flat rate to reducing balance, yes its confusing for customers - so what, maybe masking some rate changes - who cares? COnsumer protection - don't make me laugh. Back to our customers - lets see ahh yes - small print says we can stuff these people completely and lets see YES - its legal"

Junior
"Really? Are you sure? we can do whatever we want to the rate and fix? and its legal? - also in an era of job uncertainty do we want to pressure them more"

"Cretin. Anyhow lets move them off EIBOR to the "SCB rip-off rate ("SCBROR" so no matter what central bank does to improve things we don't need to worry. Hmmm - thats not enough.. what else can we do - EIBOR is falling so a high "SCBROR" looks too obvious - YES i am a genious - lets fix them there for 5 years at the highest rate"

"But sir thats usurious - terrible"

"Cretin. Okay 12 months - lets milk them as much as we can, should be good for at least a couple of years"


Thats my story - i've made a formal complaint to central bank after getting nowhere with SCB (they ignored me in the end).

SCB you disgust me.

KFH

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