Brokers’ chief focus is always the delivery of good customer service. No matter how good the mortgage advice, however, this is difficult to achieve without excellent administration and support staff.
Many people across the mortgage sector describe admin staff as ‘unsung heroes’, saying their role is sometimes overlooked — despite the vital part they play in ensuring applications are processed efficiently, enabling customers to secure mortgage offers in a timely fashion.
Mortgage Advice Point director Hemat Natha points out that the term ‘administrator’ covers a range of roles, from assistant to case manager and paraplanner.
Administration is the backbone of my business and essential to a positive client experience
“To deliver service and excellent advice you need a team. Every person in the team is essential but arguably it’s the support team that’s the most important,” he says.
Wyke Financial managing director Daniel Wyke agrees.
“Any brokerage looking to thrive must have excellent support behind the broker team. The idea that not having admin support saves cost is completely counterproductive.”
Regulation and market conditions
This administrative role has become more important recently thanks to the new Consumer Duty, which requires brokers to prove how the service offered, fees charged and advice given represent fair value and should deliver good outcomes. Complying with this regulation is possible only with an effective administration team.
The difficult market conditions over the past year have also highlighted the importance of good administrative systems. With lenders withdrawing rates at short notice, and delays due to incomplete or wrongly completed applications, customers potentially missed out on deals and faced significantly higher repayments.
The best mortgage administrators help improve broker businesses by finding new ways of doing things, introducing new processes and developing key relationships
Pepper Money has recently conducted research among administrators to obtain a more complete picture of the work they do and fully understand the challenges faced in current mortgage market conditions.
Not surprisingly, the results reveal that the role involves more than data processing and chasing the progress on applications.
Pepper’s report shows today’s administrators need a thorough knowledge of lenders’ varying processes and requirements, and also good communication skills, with many liaising with lenders, third-party packagers and customers.
Pepper Money sales director Paul Adams says: “Mortgage administrators play an integral role in ensuring that homebuyers and remortgage customers secure their funds in time to meet their goals. These situations often come down to small details, and good administrators are the masters of those details.
“The best mortgage administrators also help improve broker businesses by finding new ways of doing things, introducing new processes and developing key relationships.”
While there are many training courses, qualifications and support structures to help advisers grow, there is a lack of similar things for administrators
Brokers agree that good administration staff can have a positive effect on the business’s bottom line.
Kind Financial Services mortgage and protection adviser Sabrina Hall says: “Administration is the backbone of my business and essential to a positive client experience. This in turn leads to referrals from clients, which help grow my business.”
First-hand knowledge
Brokers value the insight and first-hand knowledge administrators have about lenders — not only on different types of mortgage business but on the length of time applications are taking to process at any point. This knowledge prevents delays with customer applications — and can help resolve problems should they arise.
London & Country associate director of communications David Hollingworth says: “Lenders have different quirks, whether that is part of the application process or the documentation that is acceptable.”
Good administration is an essential part of any quality mortgage broker, and generally speaking it is a different skillset from that of a broker
While lenders and brokers aim to build efficient processes, these are no substitute for an experienced administrator able to pre-empt problems, he says.
“Good administrators will also develop relationships with back-office staff at lenders, and this can be vitally important when resolving any problems that arise and getting a case back on track.”
When time is of the essence, adds Hollingworth, knowledge of which lenders can process applications quickly can be vital in securing the best mortgage rates. This has been clear over the past year, with rates rising.
Effective administration can also ensure customers get the best deals as rates edge downwards, as has been seen in recent weeks, says Doug Hall, director at mortgage packager and distributor 3mc.
“In October 2022, we started an additional check to see if lenders had offered better rates after the application had been made. If so, this would be flagged up to the brokers. This administrative step can deliver positive outcomes for broker clients and ultimately their customers.”
Good administrators are particularly valuable across more specialist parts of the mortgage sector — be it self-employed mortgages, adverse credit, portfolio landlords or equity release. These cases typically require additional information during the application stage and there may be significantly more variation in the mort-gage criteria used by lenders in these sectors.
These situations often come down to small details, and good administrators are the masters of those details
Some lenders may underwrite cases individually, compared to the more automated process used with mainstream residential applications.
Hall says many brokers use packagers for these specialist areas.
“Brokers and their administrators will not be dealing with these sorts of case on a daily basis, so will often use a packager and its administration team to place these cases and ensure high service standards are maintained.”
New challenges
Pepper Money’s research looks at the specific challenges administrators face today. Given market conditions, it is perhaps unsurprising that delays and protracted processing times are seen as the biggest challenges — cited by more than one in five administrators.
Meanwhile, just under one in five administrators (18%) says the biggest challenge is gaining access to underwriting teams, while 18% cite the quality of communication from those same underwriting teams.
The research also asked administrators how long it was taking lenders to process applications. The most common answer — cited by over a third — was between six days and a fortnight.
However, administrators report that market conditions have led these timescales to slip. Two-thirds (63%) of administrators said the time taken to process a mortgage application had increased, with 18% stating it had done so significantly.
It is clear these delays are creating more work for administrators, causing potential bottlenecks in the system. Hall also points out that frequent rate changes create additional administrative work, while admin staff are dealing with “unpredictable” service levels from solicitors.
Developing key skills
What skills do you need to be a good administrator? Pepper Money’s research makes it clear that being organised and having good communication skills are essential.
Administrators don’t just communicate with lenders and customers. The Mortgage Expert founder Darryl Dhoffer points out that, as well as helping with pack-aging queries, there is regular liaison with insurance providers, estate agents and solicitors.
Every person in the team is essential but arguably it’s the support team that’s the most important
Barnside Financial Management financial adviser Scott Taylor-Barr says he’d like to see more focus on developing skills and training for administrators.
“Good administration is an essential part of any quality mortgage broker, and generally speaking it is a different skillset from that of a broker. It therefore makes sense to have people who play to their strengths and support one another.
“This can free up brokers to focus on writing more business, rather than being on hold to lenders for application updates. It also results in more compliant and complete customer files and better customer outcomes.”
He adds: “While there are many training courses, qualifications and support structures to help advisers grow, there is a lack of similar things for administrators, which is a shame and a missed opportunity to drive further efficiency and improve the customer experience.”
The idea that not having admin support saves cost is completely counterproductive
That said, Pepper’s research found that a large proportion of administrators (65%) were also mortgage brokers, working across both disciplines. Just under three in 10 said they worked purely as a mortgage administrator.
Despite the challenges of the current market, Pepper Money found that most administrators were happy in their job.
Six in 10 envisaged continuing in this role for the next few years, while just over one in 10 said they would look for an alternative role in the mortgage or financial services sector.
