Call centres have long been considered a necessary evil; ask any adviser how he or she likes dealing with lenders and the face-to-face approach wins hands down.
David Mead, managing director of internet-based adviser Flexible-mortgage.net, says that in an ideal world the majority of broker/lender interaction would happen face-to-face.
The call centre model, where you have a business development manager (BDM) and then a call centre to deal with technical challenges as you go through the application process has long been an industry norm.
Mead admits it would be impossible to expect lenders to be with all brokers at all times. He adds: “They can’t guide you through everything, they simply don’t have the resources, staff, or the time.”
As chief of a medium-sized broker, with 25 registered individuals, Mead accepts that the size of his business and the amount of mortgages it writes means it does get visited regularly by BDMs.
“We do see BDMs very regularly and know that we most certainly benefit from having contact with lots of them.” This contact gives brokers the opportunity to benefit from ongoing training. “It means the lender can focus personal resources where they are needed.”
He adds: “Of course when questions come up we use call centres, but having the lender visit us personally is great for bonding. It makes us feel more confident when we do use that particular lender’s call centre, because they have shown good will in developing a personal relationship with us.”
Bond aside, the fact is, says Mead, you are far more likely to understand the nuances of a lender’s underwriting process if you meet the actual people involved.
He rates Abbey, Halifax, Northern Rock and HBOS as being mainstream lenders with extremely good BDMs, call centre serviced combination.
Specialised lenders, such as BM Solutions, GMAC-RFC are also starting to make more of an effort.
He says: “These lenders are extremely thorough in wanting to make themselves known and one of the ways to do that is by coming in and seeing us.”
That said, there are some lenders, which Mead won’t name, who never visit. Mead says: “There’s one mainstream lender, and I can’t remember the last time they came to see us.”
Appreciating the effort
Lenders will come in and teach brokers about their product and they will also make an effort to go through the online application process – something that mortgage intermediaries really appreciate.
“There are some lenders who will opt for telephone call centres only. But one of the reasons we manage to attract brokers is because we are large enough to warrant a visit by a BDM. We have 25 brokers here so a lender will know how important it is to cultivate that personal contact.”
Mead sympathises with smaller brokers. “The fact is there are many brokers out there who don’t even get visited by BDMs because lenders don't have the time or inclination to go and see them.”
The volume of business they produce doesn’t even register on the scale. Of course all lenders have to offer some kind of broker support, even those who don’t tend to do a lot of business through intermediaries.
Mead says the quality of staff in many of the call centres is still questionable across the board. “They are not customer-facing so they don’t have to have the same qualifications as someone giving advice. It I were to say one thing to the industry, I would say improve the quality of staff who work in call centres.”
James Cotton, mortgage specialist at London & Country, says that since mortgage regulation the kind of service offered by lenders has come under the microscope.
Cotton says that the major gripe is when service isn’t what you would expect. “Even some of the larger lenders have problems,” he says.
London & Country benefits from even more BDM interaction than businesses like Flexible-mortgage.net. “Some lenders will simply focus on mortgage intermediaries who write a lot of business, or who specialise in the niche market in which they operate. We see a lot of BDMs because we do a lot of business.”
For the most part L&C is extremely happy with the way it is serviced by lenders.
Cotton explains: “The odd case we have got that has been tough and we’ve had to go through a call centre and didn’t proceed very efficiently. Equally we have to accept a lender cannot be in your office all of the time.”
Best service
It is a fact that the more mortgages you write the better service you get. But another fact is that most brokers are small sole-adviser operations, admits Cotton.
He says the best service is when you have a dedicated BDM and you have got a good call centre service.
“Not all lenders have dedicated BDMs. The best service deal is when you know you can pick up the phone and you know the person you are speaking to is qualified and savvy enough to deal with your query.”
Simple queries are easier to deal with than say, issues with an underwriter. And that’s when a call centre service may become inadequate.
“That’s when you really need a dedicated manager who knows the in’s and out’s of something, and it’s also the difference between being able to secure the client a mortgage or not. There is no substitute for a BDM you can call.”
Smaller lenders get the thumbs up from L&C for their service.
Cotton explains: “The organisation is smaller so there are less people to have to deal with. Whether you are a large or small broker you’ll often get the same service.”
Some of the smaller building societies are brilliant, says Cotton. From technical issues to bigger ones like underwriting, they tend to excel.
But this small scale and more personal service can become an issue when a smaller lenders launches a really good product.
Cotton says: “I don’t want to name names but there has been a couple of recent examples where some smaller lenders launched some really good deals, and they were completely overwhelmed.”
Even larger lenders can get swamped too. “It has happened with the banks, and it’s when service becomes an issue – you want to get that product for a client but of course some of these offers are limited.”
Back to basics
Concerns over service have seen several lenders to go back to basics.
Linda Will, managing director of Accord Mortgages, claims that as competition hots up in the market, especially among niche players, a good service is often the best way of assuring advisers that they are valued. And in turn this makes them more likely to return to a particular lender.
One of the ways in which lenders like Accord are doing this is by reviewing how they use functional but ‘faceless’ call centres.
“We don’t have call centres anymore, we got rid of them just over a year ago,” says Will.
When Accord opted to ditch the centralised call centre model, it had to think long and hard.
“It wasn’t a cheap decision to make, and we could have carried on alongside that service model but we got permission from the board to try something we knew would help us grow business.”
Accord now has teams dedicated to advisers. Each team consists of a case manager, an underwriter and processors. The case manager effectively takes responsibility for the whole process.
Case managers can normally be accessed by advisers and make the day-to-day decisions necessary to make applications as quick as possible.
“Teams are quite tight knit,” says Will. “This gives a sense of ownership to everyone involved.”
“Because the teams see each application through, they know all the details. What used to happen before was that they weren’t necessarily exposed to the process, for example, a processor might not realise how one stupid ommision can cause problems later on. There was quite simply no sense of connection, people on the phone often have no power to fix things.”
Accord has over 100 case managers UK-wide. Will admits that, as a smaller lender, it hasn’t the worries about size and bureaucracy that some of the larger lenders have.
“We have an advantage with our size. We are more able to monitor how well each team is doing their job. And of course, each team can build better relations with advisers.”
Even the smaller advisers have a dedicated case manager, again perhaps an advantage of Accord’s size.
One of the reasons for Accord’s switch was to time with its entry into the credit impaired market. “The kinds of mortgages we started to offer necessitated a switch to the more personalised approach.”
This is demonstrated, says Will, in the underwriting process. The adviser will know the underwriter as well as the case manager. This means the case manger can deal with the adviser and tell them what’s going on. The case manager is authorised to say okay. “
It makes everyone’s job more interesting,” says Will.
Another, perhaps anticipated consequence of the new system, is that staff seem to really enjoy their jobs. And if people enjoy their job they are far more likely to offer better service.
“Of course when we embarked on the change we did lose some staff. But we were able to ‘grandfather’ some people into their new, more responsible roles. Those without the skills simply left and the end result is that we have a team of highly skilled people who are constantly being trained. Staff sickness is down 50 per cent and our staff turnover is now extremely low.”
OSUB
Of course the real difference for brokers is the experience. “We regularly survey advisers to find out how much they like our new system and we never get any complaints.”
A more personal approach
Accord isn’t the only lender to have adopted a more personal approach.
Abbey has also done away with centralised call centres. Joe Wiggins, media relations manager at Abbey, said the decision to set up dencentralised regional offices with teams dedicated to advisers was a result of its take-over by Spanish banking giant, Banco Santander.
Like Accord, brokers dealing with Abbey can contact underwriters direct. “It’s about being able to speak to the relavant person, which means applications that come into difficulties can in the end be processed more quickly.”
Wiggins admits that mortgage regulation meant having a tighter ship has also helped ease Abbey’s relationship with brokers.
He says even smaller advisers get a dedicated team, so they are no longer forced to have to deal with different call centres.
“What good is dealing with someone in Newcastle when they are a mortgage broker in Kent or London? Not only does centralising the call centre system show our commitment to advisers it also improves our service.”
With more personalised service making a comeback, lenders are also starting to use ever more modern ways of keeping brokers happy.
Eliot Nathan, head of operations at John Charcol, says he expects more lenders to be making use of internet-based messaging services.
He believes the internet can offer advisers a quick fix to technical problems but that the use of such servicing will be combined the kind of team effort offered by the likes of Abbey and Accord.
Nathan says: “The idea of being able to interact directly with an underwriter is by far one of the best developments, and is a simple but innovative way of improving broker and client service.”
