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Mortgage brokers agree that one of Australia’s smaller banks has significantly improved its home loan offering over the last 12 months.
Heritage Bank has taken the title of Rising Star in the 2016 Momentum Intelligence Third-Party Lending Report: Non-Major Banks, rising from 10th position last year to sixth position in 2016.
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Heritage had the highest year-on-year increase in its overall aggregate score across the 23 metrics.
Momentum Intelligence head of client services and sales research Andy Scott said that while ING Direct was ranked number one overall in the research, it's important to note that all non-major banks received higher scores overall than last year.
“Heritage Bank's increase of 17.56 per cent illustrates that brokers are receptive to banks that listen to broker feedback and act on their suggestions,” he said.
Paul Francis, general manager for retail services says Heritage Bank is “absolutely delighted” to be the most improved in this year’s report.
“This is a very pleasing result,” he said, “however, we are absolutely aware that we are on a continuous improvement journey.”
Mr Francis said Heritage has been “listening carefully” to what its broker partners have asked for — and is working hard to deliver on those requests. Mr Francis says that Heritage paid close attention to last year’s report.
“While we have had a significant improvement from last year, the key learning for us is that we still have to listen to all the feedback our broker partners provide us and work as hard as we can to match their needs.
“Our key focus has been, and will continue to be, on our service — both our processes and turnaround times.”
Heritage has been recently focusing on giving more structure to its broker offering to “build deep and lasting relationships with broker partners”. Earlier this year, the bank appointed Michael Trencher as the head of broker distribution, with a view to reposition the bank’s model and enhance its value proposition.
Heritage has also spent some time reviewing its loan processing structures along with its credit policies — both of which are linked to its broader corporate strategic growth strategy.
The group’s focus on growth in the six months to June this year has reportedly helped deliver a 7.1 per cent growth in its mortgage portfolio over the same period.
[Related: Heritage Bank grows mortgage portfolio]
