Research from Precise Mortgages found that the top 10 most common reasons lenders request additional information regarding bank statements includes when fewer than the requested number of statements has been supplied.

The second most common reason was when statements were not consecutive or sequentially numbered, or there were missing periods.

As well as this, issues were found to arise when the bank or building society logo is missing, the full bank account number and sort code are not shown, the customer’s name and address does not match the application and when the statement has no running balance.

Morris said: “There are a number of pitfalls that could cause a delay in getting a mortgage application over the line and when timing is tight, this is an area easy to overlook.”

Further pitfalls included when the statement does not show evidence of regular credits, the statement has no expected outgoing activity and when the statement for the account nominated for the direct debt mortgage payment has not been supplied.

Morris goes on to add: “Brokers may not realise the implications of sending in an application which turns out to be fraudulent, these could range from a red flag on future applications to potential fines and jail time.”

The final most common reason lender’s need to request additional information is for portfolio applications, when statements demonstrating cashflow have not been supplied.