PNC Financial Services Group

I applied to receive the HAMP program package to see what was being offered and whether I qualified for any generic reductions in interest or fees. For over 20 years I have never been late with payments and I do not intend to be in the future. However, since applying for the HAMP program application package from my lender, PNC Mortgage, every time I call customer service now I am immediately and automatically transferred to the Collections and Loss Mitigation department and am treated like a 3rd class citizen. I receive calls from Collections stating that "This is an attempt to Collect a Debt and PNC Mortage will pursue all its rights against my property to collect the debt," and I have to listen to this each time I call. After speaking with someone in Collections, they told me that I needed to FAX a letter to them stating that I am no longer interested in the program. I did this on Jan 19th and by January 26th I am still going straight to collections every time I call, even though they show they received the FAXed letter on Jan. 19th! Further calls have led me nowhere and two letters to the executive branch office are completely ignored.

My account is in good standing now and always has been. My credit rating is over 780, but I feel that I am being discriminated against after simply asking for the program package. This is not right, and certainly not the way to treat a good customer. I want this resolved! Meanwhile, you can see why I cannot and would not recommend PNC Mortgage to ANYONE.

Our problems with national city mortgage began in the fall of 2007. We had been having some serious financial problems and lapsed on our homeowners insurance for a short period of time that consisted of only 3 months. Being that national city likes to use forced placed insurance as a form of "punishment" they attached their overpriced and unverified form of insurance on our loan in the additional amount of $800.00 per month! Our payment was at that time $665.00 so that made the total amount due each month around $1400.00. Now we did not know nor understand at that time that ncm would not accept partial payments and we continued to pay our normal monthly payment and then pay what we could to pay down the amount of the forced placed insurance they tacked on to our account for those 3 months. That's when all of our problems really began with this company. After several months of assuming that everything was ok, we receive a letter in the mail from national city with all of the payments from the last 6 months in them with the letter stating that not only are they not accepting our "partial" payments they are placing our home loan in foreclosure due to us making these so-called "partial payments". Now mind you in that 6 month period of time they never called us, never notified us that they did not accept partial payments, nothing. They classified the payments as "partial" because we did not pay the lump sum for those 3 months they tacked on the forced place insurance. Now we are in the full throws of foreclosure and are being sued and taken to court. We obtain and attorney and for several months, we haggle and negotiate a "forbearance agreement" needless to say out attorney didn't do a good job in defending our interests and we ended up getting screwed in this agreement. We had to pay a total of $1250.00 for a period from november 2008 to april 2009. Which is where we are now. We have paid all of these payments without fail not missing one payment. We have struggled to pay that high payment but we have managed to squeak by. Then on october 2, 2009 out of the blue, we receive another letter from ncm stating that yet again they are activating the "active foreclosure" status on our loan. Needless to say we are totally freaked out as we knew we had not missed one single payment. We decided that we needed to have assistance with speaking with these rep. S at ncm as we cannot ever get a straight answer from them. We had a hope now counselor on a 3-way call with ncm and we spent a total of 3 hours on the phone with 5 different people in 3 different departments to try to get to the bottom of this letter we received. We were told that we had been one day late with a payment in july 2009 and due to that they were reinstating the active foreclosure status on the loan! We literally about fell off of our chairs! One day late supposedly with a payment! We remembered that back in july of 2009 my husband spoke with a loss mitigation rep., named ms. Robin green regarding some issues we had with payments and such and this rep. Had given us permission to pay our payments on a bi-monthly basis as my husband had been laid of from one of the big 3 automakers
During the restructuring and eventual bankruptcy of the company. At that time we were bringing home half of our normal monthly income and to be able to pay the payment when we were paid made it somewhat easier for us to handle. Permission was given by the ncm rep. Ms. Robin green and she then offered (this is key, her offering) to change the payment due date to the end of the month to make sure that while we were paying biweekly through the month the total payments would be in by that date. We have since found out that it was during this conversation that all of the problems came. The same ms. Robin green is the one that sent our loan back to active foreclosure status and she did so during the that conversation. Even though she had stated that she could have sent our loan at that time to active status but wouldn't and then she is the one who then changed our due date, she is the one who now says she never said that nor offered to change the date. It is clearly evident by our payment history that coincides directly at the same time we had the conversation with ms. Robin green.

After all of the shock of everything subsided, I then began a plan of assault. I started contacting any and all persons who I felt could help me. State representatives, senators, local and national media including radio, tv and newspapers. I even have tried to make contact with oprah and dr. Phil. I am incensed at the fact that this mortgage company has had no intention of ever trying to help any homeowners keep their home. They only have one motive and that is to make the most money off of your property. National city would stand to make a healthy 100% profit off of our home as we only had a few more years to pay on it and it is worth 2 times what we owe. I was not going to allow them to take our home after we worked so hard to do everything by the book.

I was told by the loss mitigation rep. That we had to resubmit a workout package to see if we could possibly be re-approved for yet another forbearance package. I then began collecting all the documents they needed again and sent them out on wednesday, october 7th, 2009. Now mind you it usually takes them weeks if not months to put a a package together and to resubmit all the paperwork. How ironic after making contact with all of the legislators, media etc. That on friday october 9th, 2009 when I called to confirm that they had received all of the paperwork I had sent that I was then informed that national city mortgage had not only received that paperwork they had already re-figured the loan forbearance and sent the papers for our review and signature in the mail! Something is not sounding right here and I think they know they are in the wrong for what they did to us. The committed emotional terrorism with us. They were laying in wait for any reason whatsoever to pounce on our loan to wither take the house or to obtain more fees by recalculating the agreement. I was told over the phone that indeed they are charging another $8000.00 in fees for being allegedly one day late on a payment! We have not signed any papers and are having our lawyer look into the whole situation for us and I am still following up with the state reps. And senators to see what they can do. This mortgage company needs to be held accountable for what they are doing to its loan-holders and they need reprimanded severely for it. They should not be allowed to get away with what they are and have been doing. If it has happened to us I know it has and will happen to others. I will post a follow up to let everyone know what has happened. We need to look at filing a class action suit against this company for fraudulent lending practices. Good luck to all.

National City Mortgage has an outrageous and adverse practice of cashing a mortgage payment check, withdrawing the funds from the payers bank, then holding the funds for about a month, then sending the funds back by check to whatever address they have on file, then declaring that the account payment is overdue, and applying late fees, taking adverse credit reporting steps, etc. All this because they change the escrow payment amount, and if the payer does not get notice or make adjustment in payment, instead of showing a deficit in the escrow, they refuse to apply the payment at all!

This is about as insane a policy as I can imagine; they did it to me two years ago, and they have just done it again. I've asked them to contact me by email, but they refuse to do so.

This bank deserves to go broke and be taken over by a management that hopefully will be more customer friendly!

I obtained a home mortgage with national city mortgage in 2003. We had never missed payments, nor did our homeowner’s insurance lapse. After the birth of our son, I have been unable to work for several reasons, mostly health related. My husband is still working, but it is not enough to even cover the bills. This has created a huge financial stress on us for the last 20 months. It has taken all that we have and borrowing money to even make our house payments. Our homeowner’s insurance also lapsed, (which we knew we were required to have) and have been trying to get the funds together for that next.

I had called both national city mortgage’s customer service department as well as their counseling department regarding our situation to see if modifications could be made to our loan where we could reduce the payments to where they were affordable. They had indicated at that time that they could not work with us to lower the payments. During this time, I had also received letters from national city stating if I did not re-instate my homeowner’s insurance, that they would obtain it themselves. Each month, I would be hopeful that we would have the money for the insurance, but it never worked out because we barely could even get together enough for the payments. As I called national city about the payments, I would also talk to them about the insurance situation. It was obvious they knew we were in great financial distress, due to the recent payment history and the mere fact that I was frequently calling their counseling department. I had asked the representatives on several occasions, “has national city taken it upon themselves to obtain insurance yet”? The response was always “no, but you need to get your own together soon”. My response was: “thank god they haven’t got it yet; we are still trying & should have it soon”. I was told this in both 2007 & the first part of 2008. This would lead one to believe that nothing had been obtained and therefore, we still had time to get our own. It also would lead one to believe, if nothing has been obtained yet, there is nothing extra to pay for.
*especially* because we had received no documentation whatsoever of proof of an insurance policy. Usually, one does not expect to pay for something until after it is obtained.

Then just march the 6th, 2008, I received a letter dated 2/13/2008 that I was expected to pay over $5800.00 for insurance coverage that I supposeably “have had” since 4/20/2007. But as of a letter I received dated feb. 5, 2008 they were still asking for a copy of my insurance policy. Which again, leads one to believe it had not yet been obtained. When I read this, I called national city immediately. I spoke to charmaine anderson, customer service supervisor. I told her how deceptive this was to be told over & over again by both their customer service department and customer counseling departments that “insurance had not been obtained yet by national city” and never receive any proof of any policy at all, then miraculously out of the blue, I am sent a copy of the policy a year after the fact (backdated) and worse yet, the payments I could not already afford raised even higher to pay this bill (which is totally inflated anyway - regular homeowner’s insurance should be about $1600 per year – their amount was $5866.71). Instead of simply adding it to the “back end” of my loan, they remodified my entire loan without my knowledge and charged $1200 extra in additional fees to my loan to pay for this. I understand we needed to get our own insurance, but I was led to believe it was not obtained yet by national city, nor again, did I have proof of such until after the fact. The “proof of insurance” is even dated 2/13/08.
Ms. Anderson told me that if they don’t receive my new “modified” (higher) payments (with the insurance payback portion included) that she would not accept the payment, mail it back to me, & I would face foreclosure.

I reminded her about government legislation that has been passed to help homeowner’s in financial trouble and these kinds of practices are what is costing people their homes!
I told her I wouldn’t have consistently called customer service & customer counseling if we were not in financial trouble. I had expressed that to them many times very clearly. I also wouldn’t have kept asking about the insurance over & over if I had any proof or documentation the insurance that already been obtained!
The matter in which this insurance was obtained is totally deceptive and unfair. Specifically, I am requesting national city to provide several things..

•1.) show proof of my signature where I authorized them to modify my loan without my knowledge or consent
•2.) show proof of my signature where I gave them permission to tell me for a year insurance had not been obtained yet, then backdate it and charge me for it.
•3.) knowing from my many phone calls to customer service that we were experiencing financial hardship, why they did not simply add any fees to the back end of the loan so it would not have cost us $1200 in additional fees & upped our payments even higher from an amount we were already having trouble with anyway.
4.) prove that they spent that money and there was really coverage during the time they are trying to charge me for, because over & over I had been told it had not been obtained. And again, up until now, this is the first i’ve heard or seen of the actual policy.
5.) explain why I was not informed back in 2007 that they had already bought it rather than: “they’re going to if I don’t get it soon’. They even had sent a letter stating: “they still needed proof of coverage”.

I believe they are very likely charging us fees that they really did not pay, nor did we have proof of their coverage for the entire year of 2007.
What if we had a claim?
Fortunately, we didn’t. But the point is, we had no knowledge of it at all.
Again, I wouldn’t have consistently been asking their customer service department about it otherwise! Not only am I requesting these modified loan fees & the backdated insurance fees removed altogether I want my house payments lowered back down not only to what they were, but we still need help in getting them lowered in the first place to where they are affordable and we do not lose our home!

I can understand being charged for insurance from the day they obtained it for that current date forward (& it added to the back end of our loan due to financial hardship) but the manner in which this has all taken place does not seem ethical or legal at all. We would greatly appreciate some proof and clear cut answers as well as any feedback from others who may have also experienced problems with them & what they did. As of this point, our original complaint letter has been completely ignored by national city mortgage.