When selecting lenders and the people that represent you, it may not always be possible to have a choice. We were designated Russell to represent us and he managed to get our loan processed however there were multiple things along the way that certainly needed improvement and that impacted our closing date and satisfactory experience. For example:
1. Lack of a thorough and outlined step by step planned process in writing. Therefore it was difficult to track where in the process you were at any point in time.
2. Documentation tracking was poor. I had to submit the same documentation multiple times. Would be more effective and efficient to create a checklist of all documents required to complete in a checklist. For example. Checklist with document number, title, description/purpose of document, completed or not completed and date required to be completed by.
3. TD has a very bureaucratic process where people literally don't talk to each other. Instead rely on email, don't provide context and have no idea of what is going on or what the customer is experiencing. I would rather have a client service that goes to bat for me, that represents me (the consumer) that will make phone calls when most needed and get the job done on time in the shortest time possible. TD apparantely has a policy to respond to emails within 72 hours, this is not effective. As in my case there were errors on submitted documentation which means I have to wait 3 days for a document to get verified and then if an error is found I have to wait another 3 days. This happened on multiple occasions making the process very painful and frustratingly lengthy. Reviewing a document does not need to take a week.
4. Lack of empathy. Since communication is poor within the TD departments and heavily reliant on email it makes it difficult to relate to the customer. We were kept in the dark with little context as to why things were taking a long time and it appeared no one cared about contractual deadlines that needed to be met. Despite us reminding TD of the urgency of getting things done on time they proceeded to take their time (as per their 72 hr turn around) with no regard to the fact that multiple paries are impacted when delays occur that could have been completed avoided if someone reviewed documentation sooner rather than later. Certain submitted documents could have been reviewed in literally a matter of minutes, but instead took days.
5. Lack of accountability. If you make a mistake or are not meeting expectationgs, then you need to recognize that and make up for that mistake to the consumer. We pay a significant amount of money for closing costs much of which has a built in level of expectation. I dont understand why the level of service is so mediocre when we are paying upwards of 17 000 in closing costs directly related to the lender. The bank should definetely make up for this gap in performance to the customer. How? I leave that up to the concience of the bank representatives or executives - closing credits, rewards, discounts of some kind, etc.