Nationwide Building Society Conveyancing Panel Information

As is the case with the Law Society the Council of Licensed Conveyancers has begun dialogue with banks and their representative bodies to see whether and how the risks that lenders wish to mitigate could be addressed through the regulatory framework rather than via ad hoc arrangements that can differ from lender to lender. We expect that that the CLC have been in touch with lenders such as Nationwide Building Society as well as the CML.

During 2013, 68 sections of the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook P2 were changed by Nationwide Building Society. Some changes are more important than others but as a firm on the Nationwide Building Society conveyancing panel you are of course obliged to comply with individual lender requirements, as set out in Part II of the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook. Locktons have recently pointed out in an article that non-compliance with Part 2 requirements account for a number of high value claims, and it is therefore important to be aware of any particularly onerous terms that an individual lender may impose.

Remember: CML requirements are not guidelines; they are the lender client’s instructions.

When a solicitor is acting for both Nationwide Building Society and borrower there is potential for conflicts to arise. You owe duties to both clients. All information received by you from your client is confidential and cannot be disclosed without the client’s consent. In the situation you find yourself in if the purchaser will not consent to the information being passed on to the lender the solicitor must cease to act for the Nationwide Building Society and it may well be prudent you to cease to act for the purchaser as well. You can not tell the Nationwide Building Society the reason for termination of the retainer over and above the fact that a conflict has arisen. The fact that you can no longer act should alert even the most somnambulistic of lenders that something is wrong with the borrower and/or purchase. The fact that you have disinstructed yourself should not affect your Nationwide Building Society conveyancing panel status.

You will be aware of the trend in recent years for lenders such as Nationwide Building Society to take a much more pro-active approach in relation to the management and make up of their conveyancer panels. The knock on effect of this is that it is more likely that there will be a higher number of cases where a conveyancer is not on the Nationwide Building Society panel. The situation that you find yourself in is where your client’s purchaser has his/her own lawyer and Nationwide Building Society have appointed a separate lawyer to act on their behalf where the new CML Part 3 requirements apply. Section 11.1 of the UK Finance Lenders’ Handbook Part 3 requires Nationwide Building Society’s panel solicitor to ‘ ...transfer the mortgage advance directly to the Seller’s conveyancer. The Seller’s conveyancer must be required to hold the mortgage advance on the terms of the required undertaking. The example borrower’s conveyancer’s undertaking letter includes a specific example of the seller’s undertaking’. You should expect to be advised to received the mortgage advance directly from the conveyancing solicitors for Nationwide Building Society. You will no doubt be required to undertake directly to Nationwide Building Society’s solicitors to discharge any charges secured on the property and to send directly to them the executed transfer and any other documents required to enable us to effect registration. Please remember to carefully consider undertakings in accordance with your firm’s protocol and record them in your undertakings logg. Please remember that as well as this breach of this undertaking having regulatory and compliance implications it’s breach could also result in your firm being removed off the Nationwide Building Society 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 adversely impact your application but gives the Law Society a complete picture of what has happened.

You would be advised to get in touch with Nationwide Building Society to obtain standard documents. The CML Handbook incorporates an explicit inquiry for banks to reveal who to contact to obtain standard documents. Nationwide Building Society in their Part 2’s state: It helps to disclose the firm’s Nationwide Building Society solicitors panel reference.