Ms Francesca McDonagh:

Of the 9,400 customers, some were not given the legal entitlement to a tracker and some were given a tracker but there was a small marginal error of, on average, 0.15%, which I appreciate is not negligible for a large mortgage or over a long period, but it is a relatively small amount. When we looked at the correspondence with customers, there was insufficient clarity in our communication and terms and conditions that would have given them the absolute clarity they needed to understand if they were going to get a tracker or not. We had accepted that there were approximately 600 cases where it was very black and white and there was no dispute. Legally, those customers had not been given the access to a tracker to which they were entitled. There were other cases where there was a more of a discussion. Those were the approximately 6,000 customers in respect of whom there was some discussion with the Central Bank over whether legally or from a customer-centric perspective those customers should receive redress and compensation.

When I arrived, the board was very keen to come to a conclusion and wanted us to resolve this and to do the right thing by the customers. They asked me to take a fresh perspective and gave me a very clear mandate not only to look at the legal aspects, but also to ensure we had done the right thing for our customers. My conclusion was that we had included the voice of the customer in some of the analysis that had been done, but we had not gone far enough. That is why I recommended the additional 6,000 and the board was very supportive of that.