John Webster looks at Preferred’s recent Quality Circles sessions and stresses the importance of the intermediary feedback received
There has been much debate in the industry recently about the importance of Treating Customers Fairly (TCF), and rightly so. The majority of lenders have long worked hard to ensure they are providing the best possible service for their customers. But what about the service they provide to intermediaries?
Most non-conforming lenders are not customer-facing in the traditional sense, relying instead on intermediaries to introduce their products to members of the general public.
So, in very simple terms, intermediaries are the lenders’ direct customers and creating the best possible working relationship with the intermediary benefits the mortgage customer as well. But, ultimately, do lenders take the time to listen to what intermediaries have to say?
Seeking your feedback
At Preferred we understand the importance of intermediary feedback and actively go out of our way to seek it. In June 2004 we set up Quality Circles feedback sessions around the country, inviting our key intermediaries to tell us what they thought we were doing well and – more importantly – to alert us to any areas where, in their opinion, we could make improvements.
Run by an independent facilitator – Richard Hurst, director of RCH Communi-cations – the sessions provided intermediaries with a friendly and open environment in which to air their views.
The 2004 Quality Circles proved invaluable, providing us with honest feedback about our service levels and the way we do business. As a result, we decided to hold the sessions annually and invited our key intermediaries to our second set of meetings in February, March and April this year (facilitated once again by Richard).
This time we ran additional sessions to widen our coverage across the country, incorporating Scotland and Northern Ireland for the first time.
Key areas
To get the most from each session (and to maintain consistency), we decided to focus on eight key areas of discussion: communication and marketing, technology and the website, regulation, products, the sales team, service and underwriting, post-completion, and general comments.
We also asked attendees to complete a confidential questionnaire at the end of the session, answering specific questions relating to the topics that had been discussed.
We didn’t go into the sessions expecting to be told how wonderful Preferred are – nice as that would have been. We wanted to hear the truth of the matter, however painful it might be, so that we could make any necessary changes and move forward.
In fact 84 per cent of attendees said they ‘enjoy doing business with Preferred’. Now our focus is on improving things for the 7 per cent who don’t currently ‘enjoy’ working with us and the 9 per cent who didn’t express an opinion either way.
Listen and learn
Inviting intermediaries to a feedback session and then ignoring their comments would be worse than not listening in the first place – it is essential to listen but even more important to then take action.
We made several changes as a direct result of the feedback received in 2004 – such as updating our marketing material and redesigning our product guides to make them more user-friendly.
The response from the market was immediate with intermediaries keen to tell us how much they liked the redesigned guides. At the Quality Circles we’ve just held, the attendees told us how pleased they were that we had actually listened and responded to their comments.
The most visible change to come out of the 2004 Quality Circles can be seen in our rebrand. During the feedback sessions, we asked the intermediaries for their thoughts on the ‘look and feel’ of Preferred and invited them to tell us what our best attributes were.
We then followed this with extensive consultations with our employees. Working closely with our design agency we drew on this research to create the new brand for Preferred.
This year, we asked our intermediaries what they thought about the new look (launched in February) and we were delighted that just 4 per cent didn’t agree it was a better reflection of our company’s reputation and character.
Asking for feedback isn’t just an annual event. We have a reputation for being a people-focused, friendly company and we pride ourselves on being open and approachable (this is also reflected in our new brand).
Terry Woolley, director of central lending services, attended the Birmingham Quality Circles session. He said: “One of the things I most respect about Preferred is that whether things are good, bad or indifferent you can talk to them.
The Quality Circles session was vibrant and conducted in an environment that although positive was certainly no-holds barred. I wish that other lenders would follow Preferred’s lead and commit the time and resource to speak ‘with’ brokers, not ‘to’ brokers and to listen and then react to the feedback given.”
Using key contacts
In addition to the Quality Circles, one of our company objectives is for all staff to actively seek feedback from our intermediaries. Our regional sales managers and business development consultants have regular reviews with their key contacts, as do our Partnership Lending team.
In all cases the aim is to find out how the relationship is working and to ask how we can improve and develop it. Our on-site underwriters also play an important role in the feedback process as they are the first port of call and experience the day-to-day processes first-hand.
Equally, our underwriters based in head office are ‘customer-facing’ and are always available to speak directly to intermediaries.
As a result of the latest Quality Circles we have already made changes and will definitely be holding further sessions next Spring, if not before. We’re not just people-focused, we’re committed to moving the company forward and providing the best possible service levels and products for all our customers.
In order to achieve this, we need to better understand the needs of our intermediaries and to do this we need to actively listen to them and then act on the feedback received.
John Webster is managing director of Preferred
