Handelsbanken Conveyancing Panel Information

There are many reports available, five of which are as follows:

• Disclosure/Notification to Lender analysis indicating frequency and nature of disclosures - to include benchmarking analysis against aggregate data
• Average time frame to send deeds to the lender (calculated from completion date or title registration)
• Buy to Let transactions
• Average time frame to register charges at the Land Registry
• Average mortgage advance

What you should do largely depends on the reason that your firm has been removed off the Handelsbanken conveyancing panel. The top 3 reasons are as follows:

1. lack of transactions
2. the lawyer is a sole practitioner
3. as part of the HSBC panel reduction.

In these three circumstances it is unlikely that you would expected to take any action. Disclosure and other compliance considerations are more likely to be relevant if the reason for removal is due to breaches of lender requirements or allegations of fraud or negligence. Whether the reasoning should trigger a disclosable 'material' breach will depend on the firm and the circumstances around possible failures to comply with the SRA Authorisation Rules, and the SRA will judge each case on its own merits. Factors such as the detriment or risk of detriment to clients, the scale of the issue and overall impact on the firm will need to be considered in deciding whether a failure is 'material'. As the compliance officer you will need systems to identify patterns of breaches. Even if you don't consider there to be regulatory implications the firms COFA should give some thought to whether she/he needs to take any action as result of being removed from the Handelsbanken conveyancing panel.

The key here is the caveat ‘more onerous’. You have to try and take an objective view as to whether the Terms relating to the Handelsbanken conveyancing appointment (or other terms for other lenders) are ‘more onerous’ than the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook Conditions. Depending on the Terms you may need to provide details on your renewal form. If you are in any doubt please call your broker to discuss before moving forward on this question.

Handelsbanken approved solicitors have to comply with the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook instructions relating to Transfer of Equity. These are set out in Section 16.3. First, your firm must approve the form of Transfer of Equity (which should be in the Land Registry's standard form) and, if Handelsbanken require, the deed of covenant on their behalf. You will need to check Handelsbanken CML Part 2 conditions to see if Handelsbanken have standard forms of transfer and deed of covenant. Please note that this requirement can change from one transaction to another so do check! Second,When drafting or approving a transfer, you should bear in mind that: although the transfer should state that it is subject to the mortgage (identified by date and parties), it need give no details of the terms of the mortgage; the transfer need not state the amount of the mortgage debt. If it does, the figure should include both principal and interest at the date of completion, which you must check ; there should be no statement that all interest has been paid to date. Further obligations are set out in the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook which have to be followed by all firms on the Handelsbanken conveyancing panel

We would recommend that you 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 negatively affect your firm’s application but gives the CQS team a complete picture of what has happened.

You need to communicate with Handelsbanken to obtain standard documents. The The Council of Mortgage Lenders Handbook contains an individual question for lenders to set out who to contact to obtain standard documents. Handelsbanken in their Part 2’s state: Please remember to quote your Handelsbanken solicitors panel number.