Nationwide Building Society Conveyancing Panel Information

The Law Society of Scotland has advised that solicitors should check their panel status with lenders before accepting client instructions to act. The advice is lender-agnostic as it does not relate specifically to solicitors on the Nationwide Building Society conveyancing panel. The suggestion arises from the practice of a number of mortgage lenders who remove solicitors from their panels without prior notice as part of their panel management system, which can lead to some solicitors discovering this only once instructed. This is sensible advice as a client finding out midway through a transaction that their lawyer is not on the approved lender panel is very frustrating and can lead to complaints. Many online consumer forums contain posts where someone is complaining about finding that their lawyer is not on a lender conveyancing panel. Such forums include mumsnet.com

One might ordinarily expect Nationwide Building Society via their Part 2 requirements to address this but the Handbook makes no mention on time frames. You need to look at the Terms of Nationwide Building Society’s Conveyancing Panel Appointment that you are bound by. For many lender's these Terms include a clause along the following lines: ‘To keep us informed of the reasons for any delay in your being able to send the title deeds and documents we require to us within 3 months of completion or evidence of proof of registration within that period. (We will send reminders if the deeds have not been received but will not acknowledge receipt of deeds’ It is important to keep Nationwide Building Society updated. Law firms can often compound their problems by not communicating with the lender when there is a delay or problem.

You will be aware of the trend in recent years for lenders such as Nationwide Building Society 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 Nationwide Building Society panel. The situation that you find yourself in is where your client’s purchaser has his/her own lawyer and Nationwide Building Society 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 Nationwide Building Society’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 Nationwide Building Society. You will no doubt be required to undertake directly to Nationwide Building Society’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 Nationwide Building Society conveyancing panel.

6 consumers attempt to locate a solicitor on the Nationwide Building Society panel each month in Hendon. The lenderpanel directory service team who will show you how your firm can be listed by those searching for conveyancing in Hendon.

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 adversely impact your firm’s application but gives the Law Society a complete picture of what has happened.

You should contact Nationwide Building Society to obtain standard documents. The The Council of Mortgage Lenders Handbook has an explicit question for banks to cite who to contact to obtain standard documents. Nationwide Building Society in their Part 2’s state: Always remember to disclose your Nationwide Building Society solicitors panel number.