Professor Philip Lane:

If a person has been mishandled or mistreated by an individual mortgage provider, that is an issue for the ombudsman. In any individual situation with a bank official or a bank, there may be particular problems which the ombudsman can handle. Our job as the systemic regulator is to work on the framework and to make sure that banks show us their documentation and show us the process by which they interact with customers. Our regulations kick in at the level of process, documentation and systems. If any individual is in the unfortunate situation of having been mishandled by an individual lender, that is an issue for the ombudsman.

I would also like to heavily emphasise that post-crisis, the consumer protection framework also includes a consumer information role for the Competition and Consumer Protection Commission, CCPC. I would bet that not a lot of people know that the CCPC has a very good mortgage calculator on its website. A public institution, namely, the CCPC, is there to help people to work out the pros and cons of different types of mortgages. The information function used to be done by the Central Bank but now the CCPC does it. The material on its website is very nice. In the same vein, the HIA has a nice comparison tool for health insurance.