90% of brokers want to understand secured loans and have options to hand

The responses were:

- Yes: 73.89%

- Sometimes: 15.92%

- No: 10.19%.

Whilst this suggests that 90% of mortgage brokers recognize the importance of secured loans, and of gaining instant access to the relevant information, the question remains whether brokers are in reality able to gather the information they need quickly and easily when assessing the suitability of a loan compared to other alternatives.

With only one accurate and effective loan sourcing system available to brokers, many are still in the habit of calling a local broker for an off the record opinion which leaves them little paper trail when a client asks them “why?” Worse still, when the question is posed by a claims company or the FOS.

Steve Walker, Managing Director of loan sourcing and packaging specialist, Promise Solutions, commented:

“It is good that mortgage brokers now recognize the importance of considering secured loans as this will help to protect their businesses from criticism. However the challenge for brokers is to create the core competency which empowers them to deal with loans in a similar fashion to mortgages.

"Promise is the only company which has truly addressed this for brokers providing accurate sourcing and a full audit to demonstrate which products were available and why. Without this, at some point brokers could be exposed to significant risk and financial loss at the hands of aggressive claims management companies.”

This poll comes on the back of increasing industry concern about the rise of claims management companies and the need for documented evidence to support any recommendation, irrespective of whether the product is regulated by the FSA.