Mayo solicitor believes successful tracker mortgage court case is ‘first of many’

Anton McNulty

A MAYO solicitor who represented a Permanent TSB customer believed to be the first to have a tracker mortgage case settled says it will be the ‘first of many’ cases to be brought before the courts.
Permanent TSB customer Maria Page brought the case against the bank and last week’s sitting of Roscommon Circuit Court heard that the case has now been settled. Ms Page was represented by Ballyhaunis-based, O’Dwyer Solicitors, and Evan O’Dwyer believes that the case is likely to result in a number of other borrowers going down the litigation route to seek compensation.
“It has been a long battle to get to this point, as the liability hadn’t been accepted by the bank and she [Ms Page] was forced to litigate until the very end, which was unfortunate,” he said.
“This will be the first of many [cases to be brought forward]. Everyone should be checking with their banks; everyone should make an inquiry to establish if they are affected or not.”
According to the Central Bank, more than 21,000 mortgage customers have been impacted by the tracker mortgage scandal. A number of banks have commenced redress proceedings with the compensation figure to date in the order of €160m expected to rise significantly.
It was reported in The Irish Times that Ms Page sued the PTSB for breach of contract in August 2015 when she received a letter from the bank acknowledging an issue with her mortgage and offering compensation. She had been on a five-year fixed rate of 5.99 percent but was not offered the choice of a tracker rate when this term expired. She sued the bank stating she had suffered ‘loss, damage, upset, distress and inconvenience’.
The specific terms of the settlement were not read out in court but it is understood the settlement is for a sum that is a multiple of what was first offered by the bank and she also received costs.