Consumer complaint received 2016-04-21
Product: Mortgage — Conventional adjustable mortgage (ARM)
Issue: Loan servicing, payments, escrow account — 
Company: PHH Mortgage Services Corporation (WI)

The problem has been solved and we need no additional resolution. We want the issued documented in order to assist others who are experiencing difficulty with PHH and to help bring change to a company that does not demonstrate adequate customer service. We appreciate this opportunity to share our story. In general, we received abysmal customer service from PHH. PHH 's continual errors forced us to see that it would be in our best interest to stop escrowing tax & insurance with them and to be responsible for our taxes and insurance ourselves. 
At XXXX point, I feared retaliation from them for repeatedly complaining to them and feared another mistake made by them where I would have to deal with what they call the " customer service '' department. 
Trouble started early in the loan application process. 
First they rushed us papers telling us to get them back to them in a few days. Then they wanted more papers, because they did n't send the right ones the first time. I then enlisted the assistance of my wealth management team and double checked with them to be sure that I had the correct documents. We had planned to go out of town and supposedly the closing was to occur before our leaving. After several days, I emailed XXXX, the PHH loan processor, asking her if closing was going to happen before we left. Her response was to tell us we needed to send more papers to her, more documentation. ( I wonder what would have happened if I had n't asked how things were going? ) Again with assistance from my wealth management team, the loan did eventually close before our trip. 
Things got worse from there. Last year ( XXXX ), PHH did not pay the XXXX taxes! We got a note from the local tax collector telling us we were delinquent and that there was a penalty and interest added to the tax bill. After several phone calls and, once again, assistance from our XXXX XXXX team, the tax bill was eventually paid, with PHH paying the interest and penalty. This year ( XXXX ), PHH wanted to increase our escrowing by $ XXXX month even though our taxes and insurance did not increase a penny. This was a year old loan. How could such a miscalculation occur? It was at that point we decided to escrow our own taxes and insurance. PHH provided no customer service with our requests. Instead, PHH 's continual errors forced us to see that it would be in our best interest to stop escrowing tax & insurance with them and to be responsible for our taxes and insurance ourselves. PHH 's bad customer service in trying to procure from them the necessary paper work to obtain our goal of being responsible for our own taxes and insurance included multiple promises made by PHH through phone conversations with our XXXX XXXX team and me that been broken. These contact dates have occurred on or about XXXX XXXX, XXXX, XXXX. Broken promises include : not returning phone calls from a supervisor-as promised ; directly stating that those necessary forms are being mailed " today '' ; " this should not be a problem '', and failure to mention approval was needed by XXXX to stop the escrow. In addition to those previously listed phone calls, on XXXX I emailed PHH through their website 's offering of " Contact Us, '' briefly stating what we want. Eventually, with the assistance of my wealth management team I was able to reach a resolution, even though they never sent us the necessary forms until after they issued us the check for our escrow balance.