Permanent TSB has seen a further increase in customers in mortgage difficulty but the bank has also reported a sharp drop in losses.
The bank, which is 99%-owned by taxpayers, said mortgage customers more than 90 days in arrears rose to 15.1% of its loan book at the end of June, up from 13.7% at half way point of 2012. According to Central Bank data released last week the average for all Irish banks is 12.7%.
The bank said that the number of early-stage arrears cases was beginning to ease.
Permanent TSB said today that it is offering long-term solutions to struggling borrowers. It said 3,289 customers were offered deals by the end of June and that 1,823 had accepted so far.
Chief executive Jeremy Masding told Newstalk the bank was providing customers with a range of solutions and they included split mortgages (where part of the debt was parked for year), debt relief and in some cases homes would be repossessed.
Separate figures released today by Permanent TSB show a sharp reduction in losses for the first six months of the year.
Pre-tax losses fell to €131 million, down from €587m a year ago. The dramatic fall was down to a once-off gain of €318m related to the closure of one of its staff pension schemes.
The bank set aside €430m to cover losses on its loan book, a reduction of just €7m on last year.
But Masding said the bank was making progress on returning to profitability by next year.
He said a restructuring plan had been agreed by the Department of Finance and that the bank was actively lending with €121m of mortgage loans approved.
