Amazing Spanish Bank Charges

I have just sold my apartment in Tenerife, (studio) which i brought about 6 years ago. The studio had been on the market for about 6 months, it was in a great location and at the end of the day the location and the great sea view sold it. (as the studio) was a bit small.

The estate agent was fantastic, i originally brought the studio from them and they took me step by step through the buying process, So when i put it up on the market they were the first agents i put it with and sure enought within 6 months they had found a buyer.

again they took me step by step through the selling process. It was only when i talked to the bank about settling the mortage that the prices started to rocket.

i enquired at the banks head office before i went out to tenerife about the charges, which they told me that the early settlement would be 1% of the mortage, we had 64,370 euros left on the mortage so it would be about 650 euros on top.

when we got to the branch and requested an early settlement certificate which cost 31 euros plus 19 euros to print, the final figure was over a 1000euros extra, the manager seemed to pluck the figure out of his head, he said the full settlement including the mortage would be 65,950 euros, we questioned him but he just smiled and shrugged his sholders.

we wanted this wrapping up quick so the estate agent made sure that the cheque to pay the mortage off, was made payable to the bank and it was for the amount that they requested, we took the cheque into the manager to which he requested a further 668 euros extra just for putting this into our account.

from there we went to and from the estate agents, by the way, the estate agents had been constantly ringing the bank about there prices and how they had never seen these sky high charges. after a while the bank refused to talk to the spanish estate agents.

we were told to go and pay the charges but to request a claims form filled in from them so we could take it to the town hall. of course they went funny (kept us waiting for many hours)  but the price came down to 450 euros. so i replied i will pay it as they had worn me down by then. when i requester that the remainded which was left in my account should be transfered to my UK account they said that it would cost me an extra 140 euros.

I am asking does anyone know if this is common practice or are the banks so short of money that as soon as they see (non residence) on any form or cheque, the prices seem to go up and up.

 My bank (Bancaja) were at pains to explain that the 1% fee would only be on the final balance and that no fees would be payable for paying off some of the balance.  When I paid mine off (€65000) they advised me to pay €64500 off the balance one week and then close the account the following week.  They did charge me €120 to clear the cheque at the outset but only charged €5 when I paid off the entire balance.  There were two of them in the bank and they were both at pains to tell me not to pay the full €65000 off or it would cost me €650 plus the €120 to clear the cheque.

I didn't have the same problem with transferring back to UK as I was using the money to purchase another property.

That sounds a good bank, what you have. when i gave them the cheque they also said that it was not a normal cheque and that it would take two weeks to clear, so that i would have to pay an extra two weeks interest on the mortage. it has turned into a bit of a nightmare.

Would it be worth discussing this with a local citizen's advisory to check your rights and whether these sort of charges are allowable under the Bank's terms and conditions?

It would be good if there was some help, but we have just got back in the UK and the cheque will not clear until next week, the amazing thing was that after the manager kept telling us about the charges, he asked us "if we wanted to buy non-voting shares in the bank" my wife almost burst out crying and my jaw droped, at first i thought he was joking, but he was not.

Perhaps you should name and shame the Bank if you are sure that they have gone beyond acceptable fees, and tell them that you are preprared to do this on open forums to forewarn others, unless they adjust their fees!

your right, i will name the bank but not until next week, they are a big well known spanish bank and they even have a branch here in the UK, so i will be contacting the london branch when the cheque has cleared.