Kieran O'Donnell (Fine Gael) | Oireachtas source

I had a case before Christmas involving one of the mainstream banks.

I do not want to get into it in detail but this was a young lady with a young family who rang me at approximately 6.30 p.m. a week or so before Christmas. An individual had called on behalf of the bank to serve papers on her, and to say she was petrified would be an understatement. I put her straight onto someone who is involved in this area to deal with the bank. There is a problem, however, and the banks will have to change their mode of operation. The banks have to realise that they cannot go back to dealing with individuals as they previously did. That is one instance of a case which involved a mainstream bank.

What is now happening is that the banks are reviewing a lot of cases. While there may be a rule book and codes in place, I suspect that there is pressure on individuals at management level in banks to get loans in and people are cutting corners. They are not taking into account individual circumstances, as was the case with this particular lady, who is doing everything in her power to pay her mortgage although she just could not pay the full amount. I do not generally speak about these matters because they are private but this is an example of a mainstream bank dealing with a customer in a completely inappropriate way. The bank was dealing with her as a back street moneylender or whatever one might want to call it would do. A mob-style approach was adopted in dealing with this particular lady who lives on her own. It was a dark winter's evening and what was done was highly inappropriate. This needs to be fed back into the banks. This is about the person at the top who dictates the type of attitude and regime of the institution. I do not buy the theory about individuals. The banks need to deal with their customers in a legal fashion but also in a caring fashion. They should not be coming out to people in the dead of night.