My mission Down Under to replace a second lost wedding ring

Jill replies
I explained to DHL that you had bought the new ring from a supplier in Australia and that the transaction for tax and VAT should have been based on Australian dollars not US dollars. It said: “All items sent internationally must be accompanied by a commercial invoice specifying the currency of the goods value declared, which is used to calculate import duty and VAT. In this case the invoice did not state a currency, and so the shipment was entered as USD by default by customs.”

It has now calculated the duties at £37 and VAT at £192.41 and has decided to waive an £11 processing charge “as a gesture of goodwill for inconvenience” so you will have to pay a total of £229.42.

You told me this is the second time you have lost your wedding ring in eight years of marriage. You said: “I lost the first in the sea at Whitstable in 2015, jumping in a canoe to go ‘rescue’ our kids who were messing about. As I landed the canoe back, with my fingers curled round the paddle, I saw the ring slip off and land in the surf . . . I spent all week beachcombing but of course it never turned up.”

The second ring was lost while you were playing golf at your local course, somewhere between the sixth hole and the car park. “We searched the car park and the greens, and the route I walked, for days and days,” you said. “The club were helpful and the members informed too, in case anyone found it in the grass. Never turned up. Probably got swept in a mower and is now in the compost bins.”

Apparently the traditional ninth wedding anniversary gift is pottery or willow, but I suggest that your wife buys you a metal detector.

Covid grant means I can’t get a mortgage

My wife and I are separating amicably and I need to transfer our mortgage to my name to release her so she can move on. Despite passing affordability tests and being told after an initial assessment by a NatWest adviser that all was OK, NatWest is now refusing the transfer to me because I claimed three grants under the Covid self-employment income support scheme (SEISS).

NatWest is claiming that “due to coronavirus” it has changed its policy so that I am effectively reapplying for a mortgage and that it is refusing my reapplication and insisting I pay a £7,000 early repayment charge on the current loan. I raised a complaint and NatWest confirmed that its specialist mortgage team has declined my “application”. It will take four months before my complaint to the Financial Ombudsman is assigned to a handler.

For the record, I can afford the mortgage even without the SEISS grants. NatWest knows this but is stonewalling me. Its own website even suggests how to apply for grants in September.

This is a really horrible situation to be in. It’s the worst thing about my separation — which is saying something.

Jill replies
SEISS grants have been vital in helping the self employed through periods of low or no income during lockdown, but they have a serious side effect. Banks understandably regard applying for these grants as a sign of financial weakness and David Hollingworth from the mortgage broker London & Country says several lenders have reduced the amount they will give to borrowers who received them or are rejecting such applicants altogether.

He told me there are factors that can help, such as having at least six months left on work contracts, and a history of no big gaps between contracts, but lenders will still look carefully.

Even if you qualified for a new mortgage with NatWest, having to pay the £7,000 early redemption fee on your old one would wipe out the benefit of the SEISS grants. I asked NatWest if there was any way you could avoid this. It asked you for more information about how much you received in grants, when you last had one and your tax figures for the 2019-20 tax year. After doing this it confirmed that you could continue on the same terms as the joint mortgage, and would not have to pay early repayment charges.

NatWest said that while it is not accepting applications from customers who have applied for SEISS grants since July 14 last year, it is reviewing its stance. “We expect to launch a new proposition in August to help more self-employed people whose businesses have been affected by Covid to be eligible for a mortgage. We will require that they have been operating for at least three months leading up to application.”

Create a joint account? Lloyds iPad says no . . .

Approximately two months ago my husband was diagnosed with cancer, so we decided to ensure that our finances were in order. He has had a current account in his sole name with Lloyds Bank for 53 years and this covers the household bills. He also has a current account with Nationwide for the “fun” things in life. I have a current account with First Direct.

To ensure the safe continuation of the Lloyds and Nationwide accounts if the worse came to the worst, we went into the two banks and asked that my name be added, thereby changing them into joint accounts.

We identified ourselves with Lloyds and had a telephone appointment the following morning when we sat through a video presentation narrated by the Lloyds bank employee. We answered all the questions posed. The Lloyds employee fully expected, as did we, that this would go through perfectly well but we were informed that it hadn’t so we had an appointment the following day when we went through the video presentation yet again giving the same answers.

Again, the computer did not want to say yes.

We gave a brief account of my husband’s banking history to the manager including an occasion when he had tried to transfer money from one account to another but the request was denied. My husband rang to ask the reason and was advised that according to their accounts he was dead. The bank had muddled up his account with that of his father who had died some years before and also banked with Lloyds, although at a different branch.

A few years later there was a fraud problem on my husband’s account. All the money taken was refunded, but to stop it happening again he instigated a further level of security through Experian which means that anyone trying to access his credit report for any reason has to go through this further security and check with my husband and obtain an additional password.

We told the Lloyds manager about this but it seems that he is unable to speak personally to Lloyds’ security department to explain the situation. In fact the telephone number he rang quoted the message “your call is important to us and will be dealt with within 30 minutes”. That was when my heart sank and I knew we were going to get nowhere with Lloyds.

We now have joint accounts with Nationwide and First Direct but not Lloyds, and we are both so frustrated that something as simple as adding my name to my husband’s account could not be dealt with by Lloyds.

Jill replies
I asked you to send a photo of your husband holding that day’s newspaper and a copy of his driving licence, just to prove to Lloyds that he was definitely alive in case that confusion had cropped up again. I then asked the bank to crack on with converting his sole-name account into a joint one.

Three days later the problem was resolved: the account was in both your names and a new debit card was winging its way towards you. Lloyds told me the problem stemmed from a technical issue with one of the tablets the bank uses to open accounts in branch and it has paid your husband £250 in apology.

Bottom of the range

We bought a faulty sun lounger from The Range website. We have emailed and called to sort things out to no avail. Having looked at The Range’s Twitter page it seems hundreds of others are having similar problems. Please help.

Jill replies
The Range has clearly been struggling to provide decent customer service for online customers: of more than 12,000 reviews on Trustpilot, 45 per cent have given the company just one star — equivalent to bad. Many say the same thing: excellent products, terrible customer service.

The seat of your sun lounger was made out of a plastic woven material which had frayed on one area.

More than two weeks after I contacted the company, it finally asked you to dispose of the lounger so it could provide a refund. You are still looking forward to receiving your £65.

Can we help you?
Please email your questions to Jill Insley at questionofmoney@sundaytimes.co.uk or write to Question of Money, The Sunday Times, 1 London Bridge Street, London SE1 9GF. Please send only copies of original documents. Advice is offered without legal responsibility. We regret Jill cannot reply to everyone who contacts her.