Changes to how banks process large payments could lead to increased costs for movers of up to £28 million a year, a removal company has warned.
According to Kiwi Movers, the cut-off time for payments made using the Clearing House Automated Payment System (CHAPS) being moved back an hour and forty minutes could delay the handover of the keys by almost two hours if banks leave it later to send payments.
At present, banks are required to move the money from their account by approximately 3pm to allow for it to reach the solicitor’s account before the end of the working day.
However, the change to the new system in the summer could leave movers waiting until later in the day to collect their keys, resulting in increased removals costs of more than £100 extra.
Regan McMillan, director of Kiwi Movers, said: “Customers can’t get the keys to the property until the money transfer is complete, so if there’s a delay at the bank end, it has a knock-on effect with removals, storage and deliveries.
“The one upside of the current system is that we usually know by 4.pm whether a transfer will go through on a given day, giving us enough time to get things into storage if necessary. With the time being pushed back, removals firms could be waiting on keys for a further two hours and still to be told they’ll need to come back tomorrow. It could get quite chaotic and expensive for a lot of house buyers.”
Research by Kiwi Movers has also revealed that a majority of people who’ve bought a property in the past five years have faced unexpected costs that meant they exceeded their original moving budget.
The most common source of unexpected expenditure was bank charges for money transfers, with 65% not budgeting for these.
Insurance add-ons were another common expense that movers didn’t expect, with more than half (51%) saying they paid for indemnity insurance and went over budget as a result.
Almost one in five (17%) who went over budget and said they had to borrow as a result.
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