Paul Shearman believes a new survey will mean underperforming lenders have nowhere to hide from the wrath and judgement of frustrated brokers
When putting in the groundwork prior to launching in June this year, we undertook a large number of workshops and discussions with our advisers. What soon became clear was that inconsistent service levels from lenders was a major bone of contention.
They identified a range of issues that adversely impact on the day-to-day job of advising clients. Issues ranged from ineffective and non-existent business development managers (BDMs) through to slow case processing, inconsistent underwriting, weak technology, long call waiting times, lack of staff knowledge, loss of documentation, and being asked over and over again for the same information. Sadly, this catalogue of failings will be all too familiar for a lot of advisers in the industry.
Historically, issues such as these have been dealt with on an ad-hoc, case-by-case basis. Given the strength of feeling among our advisers however we decided that we needed a more robust, objective means of assessing the performance of our third-parties. Our response has been to set up a mortgage advisory panel.
High panel response
Originally we had envisaged a panel of 200 advisers; however interest has been so strong that we had to up that to 250 advisers which represents over 10 per cent of the whole 2,200-strong network.
The speed with which advisers have rushed to be panel members is
a good indication of the strength of feeling supporting a platform to air concerns and for resolving the problems. It is worth pointing out that the opportunity to have their voice heard is the only incentive advisers are offered for joining the panel.
The members will systematically review service levels each quarter, starting at the end of August, for their views on all the key components of our mortgage proposition, including lenders, general insurance providers, packagers, conveyancing services and sourcing software providers.
Adviser survey
The way the survey has been constructed – using some of the latest online research software – allows for a quick turnaround of results and analysis. It will be managed by Nunwood and will seek to cover all aspects of the service that is provided by lenders to advisers, encompassing the following:
The frequency and quality of contact with BDMs/sales support.
The quality, competitiveness and distinctiveness of lenders’ products.
Lenders’ support in terms of exclusives.
The sophistication, reliability and ease-of-use of lender technology.
The speed, efficiency and effectiveness of lenders in case processing.
The speed, efficiency and consistency of underwriting.
The quality and ease of production of KFIs.
Regularity and nature of unauthorised cross-selling.
Effectiveness of lender complaint handling.
It will also aim to identify those lenders our advisers see as the most and least intermediary-friendly and/or focused. Across the nine different areas detailed above are almost 70 different variables for advisers to score lenders and other providers within our mortgage proposition.
The scores will be combined with an assessment of the factors most important to advisers to identify the ‘service fundamentals’ and the ‘nice to haves’.
Broker grief
Importantly, advisers will also have the opportunity to add written comments on areas that are causing them most grief and/or reducing their effectiveness. They will also be able to provide suggestions on what lenders should be doing to address these problems.
Getting statistically valid data is central to the survey and with some 250 contributors, we are confident that this will be achieved. Where we are not comfortable with the robustness of the results for a specific lender we will ensure that this is highlighted.
The output of the survey will be a detailed assessment of all our major lenders, highlighting both the relative strengths and weaknesses of their propositions. This will be provided to the lenders and the network will be agreeing quarterly action plans to promote the strengths and address the problem areas.
No hiding
Details of the questions and advisers on our advisory panel will be freely shared with the appropriate lenders. The results will also be published on our portal, providing our advisers with all the information they need to make informed decisions on lender choice as far as service is concerned. Over time, the network will also be flagging up improvers and those with service deteriorating most rapidly.
We are not prepared to have our brand and the reputation of our adviser partners undermined by poor service delivery. So any sustained period of poor performance will lead to some tough discussions with lenders and where there is no resolution they will be removed from the panel.
Having consistent service levels is a goal the whole industry should be striving towards and weeding out the bad apples is in everyone’s best interests.
Paul Shearman is mortgage proposition director at Openwork
