AMI's departing chief executive on why the industry needs to assess its approach carefully
The outgoing chief executive of the Association of Mortgage Intermediaries (AMI), Robert Sinclair, has expressed his concern about the direction of the industry in its adoption of artificial intelligence, describing AI as “dangerous”.
In an exclusive interview with Mortgage Introducer, Sinclair (pictured) said he struggled to see the commercial benefit of the technology the mortgage market was embracing, and how it could help build relationships. He believes too that his role at AMI needs to be filled by someone from a different generation, to have the debate about AI, going forward.
Yesterday was Sinclair’s 46th anniversary of beginning his working life – he started at Midland Bank and latterly moved to Santander. Sixteen of those years have been leading AMI, a leadership role he will now vacate as he semi-retires from the business.
“It will be a wrench to leave because it’s something I’ve worked very hard to build up and done a lot with,” Sinclair said. “But there comes a point, also, where you’ve got to look at the industry and the next generation, and the world is moving to a different world, which is very tech-enabled.
“I think it would be better if somebody else comes in and runs all of that, rather than it being me with my, possibly, long out of date views on certain things. I have certain views about advice and structures. Other people see a world that’s much more tech-enabled, and I still think human intervention is the answer - and maybe other people need to have a look at all of that, think about the business policy we want for the future.”
Did Sinclair think he was out of step, then, with the direction of the mortgage industry, in the way it’s moving technologically, particularly with AI?
“Yes, I do,” he agreed. “I think AI is dangerous because I think AI is actually focused on what’s happened in the past and not the future. With AI, we learn from the past, it’s not got that ability to intuitively think about the future, at this point anyway, or the bits that do are very expensive and are therefore not going to get applied commercially in this type of area.
“There’s also people who think they can solve everything by tech, and actually I struggle to work out where the commercial benefit is in putting it into tech. There’s elements of ‘how do you build a relationship with a customer, because someone’s just dropped it all into a machine?’ When you come to talk to them, you come in cold with no actual feel for them. I just don’t think it works in what is a sales industry.”
He observed: “I just think it deserves a different age group coming in to have all that discussion, because it’s their future, not mine.”
Why is Robert Sinclair leaving AMI?
Sinclair intends to step down from his role at AMI at the end of the year, and the search for his replacement has begun.
“I will be 68, and now is the time for me to go and spend some time on me, as opposed to working full time,” he explained. “It doesn’t mean I’m going to stop doing anything altogether. I have one non-exec role, I hope to maybe secure another couple, maybe a charitable role, and that will be all I want to do.”
He is most proud, he said, of being a voice for the industry during his tenure, of helping forge a genuinely respectful relationship between lenders and brokers, and he is proud, too, of some of what he considers his wins with the industry’s regulator, the Financial Conduct Authority.
How, then, does Sinclair view the mortgage market, as he prepares to stand down?
“It’s robustly healthy,” he noted. “It’s predominantly intermediated. Customers get good advice, they get good products, they stick with them. There’s not a lot of stuff that goes wrong in it. I think it works really, really well.
“Margins are really sticky on all sides of things. The lenders aren’t making much in terms of repairing capital and the brokers aren’t making much because actually, unless they’re really good at selling protection, they tend not to make enough to reinvest in their business. So, I worry about it from that perspective. I worry about some of the fringes of the marketplace, because I still think we don’t do equity release and ‘seconds’ as well as we could do.”
Read more: FCA to probe pure protection insurance market
What challenges will the new chief executive of AMI face?
The challenges facing his successor, Sinclair said, include working with FCA regulations around protection.
“People need fully protected mortgages,” he emphasised. “And if the regulator makes it harder and harder to do that, that will be consumers in a worse position, not a better position. Price is not everything and value is not everything, because taking advice to do something you probably don’t want to spend money on is actually the thing that has to happen.”
He added: “I think the abject confusion on what the green agenda should look like in terms of either retrofit, or particularly retrofit, is going to be exceptionally challenging for everybody, not just in the mortgage side, but across the piece.”
Over 80% of all brokers belong to AMI – it is effectively their voice in discussions with policy makers, politicians and regulators. So what, then, would be the advice that Sinclair gives to brokers, as he prepares to depart from working full time in the industry.
“Keep expert in what you do, and don’t ever undervalue the amount you bring to the table,” he urged.
Among Sinclair’s plans are to travel and to spend time with his eight grandchildren. Talking to him, he seems to be remarkably upbeat about where he’s at in life.
“I’ve had a great run,” he reflected. “I’ve reached an age where I am really happy about what I’ve done and what I’ve achieved, and it’s a great job. It’s a wonderful job to give somebody and let them have a go at doing it.”
