Bank of Scotland Private Conveyancing Panel Information

The fact of the matter is that estate agents are suffering if their clients start out on the conveyancing process using a conveyancer who is not on the panel with the purchaser’s chosen lender. Many conveyancing firms are only discovering when they begin working on a case that they are no longer able to work with that lender. Given the inevitable resultant delays in the transaction the chances of an abortive deal increases dramatically. in the circumstances there is understandable anguish on the part of the estate agent as a result of the lost time should the client have to change solicitors .

The concern here is if you are expect to enter into ‘more onerous’ conditions that than the Handbook obligations. You have to try and take an objective view as to whether the Terms relating to the Bank of Scotland Private conveyancing appointment (or other terms for other lenders) are ‘more onerous’ than the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook Conditions. Depending on the Terms you may need to provide details on your renewal form. If you are in any doubt please call your broker to discuss before completing the answer.

You will be aware of the trend in recent years for lenders such as Bank of Scotland Private to take a much more pro-active approach in relation to the management and make up of their conveyancer panels. The knock on effect of this is that it is more likely that there will be a higher number of cases where a conveyancer is not on the Bank of Scotland Private panel. The situation that you find yourself in is where your client’s purchaser has his/her own lawyer and Bank of Scotland Private have appointed a separate lawyer to act on their behalf where the new CML Part 3 requirements apply. Section 11.1 of the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook Part 3 requires Bank of Scotland Private’s panel solicitor to ‘ ...transfer the mortgage advance directly to the Seller’s conveyancer. The Seller’s conveyancer must be required to hold the mortgage advance on the terms of the required undertaking. The example borrower’s conveyancer’s undertaking letter includes a specific example of the seller’s undertaking’. You should expect to be advised to received the mortgage advance directly from the conveyancing solicitors for Bank of Scotland Private. You will no doubt be required to undertake directly to Bank of Scotland Private’s solicitors to discharge any charges secured on the property and to send directly to them the executed transfer and any other documents required to enable us to effect registration. Please remember to carefully consider undertakings in accordance with your firm’s protocol and record them in your undertakings logg. Please remember that as well as this breach of this undertaking having regulatory and compliance implications it’s breach could also result in your firm being removed off the Bank of Scotland Private conveyancing panel.

It would be advisable to provide details of the date of removal, information on the reason for removal, date of appeal and any reason given for reinstatement. This should not negatively affect your application but gives the Law Society a complete picture of what has occured.

You would be advised to contact Bank of Scotland Private to obtain standard documents. The The Council of Mortgage Lenders Handbook has an explicit question for lenders to establish who to contact to obtain standard documents. Bank of Scotland Private in their Part 2’s state: Please remember to quote the firm’s Bank of Scotland Private conveyancing panel reference.