Mortgage fees baffling consumers: Which?

Research by the consumer champion revealed building societies have the greatest number of fee structures. Newcastle Building Society topped the chart with 29 fees, followed by Ipswich Building Society with 28.

Coventry, West Bromwich and Leek United Building Societies all charge 27 types of fees, while Yorkshire Building Society has 25 alongside Britannia and the Co-operative Bank.

Big name lenders Halifax and Northern Rock have 21 fees, while Lloyds TSB and Santander have 18.

Which? Money said the variety of fees was making comparing mortgages much more complex for consumers.

It also found fees had increased over the period with 81.5% of two-year tracker mortgages up to 90% LTV charged more than £990 in set-up fees compared to 20% in 2007.

In addition, just 3.7% of two-year trackers at 90% LTV were fee-free in 2010, compared to 24.4% in 2007.

James Daley, editor of Which? Money, says: "Finding the right mortgage used to be as simple as looking for the best rate but the array of fees nowadays has made it a much harder task - it has never been more difficult to understand how much a mortgage is going to cost.

"Lenders should make it clear what the total cost of a deal is so borrowers can make easy comparisons."

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• Which?