It’s more than 15 years since the tracker mortgage scandal first came to light, and six years since the Central Bank of Ireland published its final report on the matter.
Ireland’s banks have collectively paid fines worth €278 million, and millions more in compensation. Thousands of wronged customers have received payments.
It’s fair then, to think that the banks would be acutely aware of the need to be whiter than white, as it were, when it came to how they run their mortgage businesses.
Given that, the Business Post report that AIB is to contact 55,000 customers in the coming weeks having received complaints about the pace at which it is passing through rate reductions imposed by the ECB is notable.
Given the easy political points available to be scored, it was no surprise that Sinn Féin’s finance spokesman Pearse Doherty came out on Monday demanding the Central Bank investigate AIB over the matter.
[ Leaving it late to raise concern about AIB not offering a tracker mortgageOpens in new window ]
“We know that banks are making eye-watering profits and paying almost no tax. A lot of that is from squeezing homeowners and short-changing savers,” he said on Monday.
“AIB is a repeat offender, and we need to see a zero-tolerance approach from the Central Bank. The Central Bank needs to be on the side of the customer, not the banks,” he added.
Doherty’s outrage against the banks is not new, but it’s rare for any politician to lose a political point by having a go at bankers, especially in the two decades since they crashed the economy.
[ Explainer: Where does AIB fine leave wider tracker mortgage issue?Opens in new window ]
For AIB’s part, problems such as this must be infuriating. No sooner is the bank back in private hands and the way open to increase pay, than problems such as this emerge. The caricature of nasty bankers making millions in profits at the expense of the little people is an easy one to draw.
Justified or not, that is the perception of the public at large. At a time when AIB is making an annual profit of more than €2 billion, the last thing it needs to do is appear to confirm the worst of the banker stereotype.
