Abbey proves the dearest

Abbey National has been named Britain's most expensive major mortgage lender in a new survey. It reveals that the bank charges its typical standard rate home loan customers hundreds of pounds more a year than rivals.

At the other end of the scale, Egg, Nationwide and HSBC offer the best value when it comes to how much their standard variable rate borrowers pay.

The figures, from financial data provider Moneyfacts, reveal that over the past 12 months an Egg customer with a £100,000 standard variable rate mortgage has paid out £1,333 less than an equivalent borrower with Abbey National, Britain's second-largest lender.

The survey of Britain's top 35 mortgage lenders lets borrowers see at a glance how much their interest payments are costing them, and shows the savings that can be made by switching deals. But it only shows the annual bill for people on standard variable rates, which means it won't be of much help to the millions of people on deals such as fixed rates and discounted rate mortgages.

Moneyfacts looked at the total interest someone with a £100,000 standard rate mortgage would have forked out between January 1 and December 31 this year.

Online bank Egg and Nationwide building society came out joint cheapest with an interest bill for the year of £4,740. Egg's standard rate is currently a low 4.74%. Nationwide, meanwhile, will be pleased at coming out top - it will feel vindicated after it was slated by some commentators for adopting a new strategy of "fairness" on mortgages.

In second, third and fourth place respectively were HSBC (£4,750), Intelligent Finance, the Halifax's phone and online bank (£4,850), and Stan dard Life Bank (£5,200). Five of the top 10 cheapest lenders were building societies - the other four apart from Nationwide were the Yorkshire (£5,450), Principality (£5,550), Cheshire (£5,650) and Portman (£5,650).

However, a number of lenders offer cheaper "loyalty rates" to their long-standing borrowers, and if you take these into account the West Bromwich, Skipton, Newcastle and Coventry building societies also scored highly.

At the very bottom of the table - the same position it occupied last year - was Abbey National, which had a total annual interest bill of £6,073. Its standard variable rate is currently 5.94%. Abbey was keen to point out that it writes to its SVR customers "frequently," encouraging them to contact the bank if they are thinking of moving to a different deal.

However it doesn't publish details of products available to these people - it says what it will offer each person will depend on their circumstances.

Second-from-bottom was a position shared by no less than 11 institutions including Alliance & Leicester, Barclays, Cheltenham & Gloucester, NatWest and Woolwich. They all came in with a total annual interest bill of £5,950. Other below par performers included Britannia building society (£5,915 - this is the rate paid by borrowers who have been with the society for less than five years. Those who have been customers for longer get better rates).

Britain's biggest mortgage lender, the Halifax came in at £5,750 - £900 more than its Intelligent Finance subsidiary charged.

Melanie Stewart at Moneyfacts says: "The top half of the table is once more dominated by mutual building societies and direct lenders, with the exception of HSBC, which was the first lender to move away from traditional standard variable rates.

Nationwide and HSBC's commitment to fairness for all borrowers and Egg's simplistic approach to mortgages continues to reap rewards."

The fact the survey focuses on what people on the standard rate pay rather than those on special deals, means it can provide a good insight into which lenders play fair over the medium to long term and offer good value to those customers who stay put.

However, mortgage customers don't spend much time on their bank or building society's standard rate. They aim to hop from one competitive deal to another. There are lenders offering new discounted and fixed rate deals for under 4%.