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Citibank’s managing director head of mortgages, Vibha Coburn, has a wealth of industry knowledge across a number of countries. She shares her insights, as well as what the future holds for Citi
You spent almost 13 years working in Singapore and have dealt with mortgage brokers across the world. What are the main differences between Australian brokers and those elsewhere in the world?
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Brokers are embedded in the mortgage market here. I meet brokers who are today helping the third generation of their first client’s family. The idea of making a client for life is really alive and well in Australia, and that’s largely due to the absolute professionalism and expertise of mortgage broking here. More and more people are seeking brokers out – it’s now common place to do so.
In Asia Pacific, wealth is more measured around non-property asset classes as opposed to the size of your property portfolio. Brokers are mainly used in the commercial and leasing areas, and the industry is not as well structured, regulated and developed as it is in Australia.
How do lending products in your core market areas (USA and Asia) differ from what is available in Australia? Do you see the opportunity for innovation in Australia with any of these products?
The benefit of Citi being a global bank, with a presence in more than 100 countries, the network, expertise and depth of information we have is immense. Citi was the first lender to introduce a line of credit product with our Mortgage Power. Since then, the industry has sorely been missing any kind of new product innovation. Granted there has been digital innovation and self-managed super (SMSF) is not mainstream, but other than this and price-driven change, we are largely still selling the same mortgage products to today’s consumer that we sold to their parents.
One product worth thinking about is the differential offset account that we offer across Asia in countries like Taiwan and Singapore. At the moment, we offer it in Australia but not in the same way as we offer it elsewhere. For example, we could be pricing them differentially and offering people an offset more in tune with what they want in terms of the percentage they want to offset. Like Mortgage Power, innovation in the future will focus around flexibility for the customer, and Citi will use its global presence to source this internationally and bring it to the Australian market.
Citibank is a global bank and with that comes many advantages, but what do you say to brokers who are concerned they may not be offered a personalised service at Citi?
Year on year, broker surveys produced by ourselves or industry media have shown our BDM support is of the highest calibre. While we are a global bank, we pride ourselves on our business having a local feel to it. We offer the strength of a large organisation and the versatility and nimbleness of a local non-major lender, with a highly personalised level of service.
The attitude of providing a good customer experience is something that resonates through all levels of management here. This year, we introduced our ownership model, with credit officers taking ownership of applications from submission through to approval. Brokers deal with the one person all throughout this process, which allows for better cohesion on both sides. We implemented this based on broker feedback, and it has really paid dividends.
We’ve made great strides in building our service proposition over the past two and half years, and this has been achieved by ensuring our brokers and customers have access to all levels of management and by ensuring we maintain strong channels of communication with our broker partners.
Are there any business leaders or companies you look to for inspiration or ideas in dealing in the mortgage broking space?
As a bank, we definitely look outside of our industry to improve our proposition. We look at companies that have consistently high Net Promoter Scores (NPS) to best measure ourselves amongst global brands with high customer advocacy – NPS is like a customer satisfaction survey that assesses a customer’s loyalty. For example, Apple, Amazon and Samsung score very well and we’ll learn from these groups and look to build a brand that our own customers will proudly promote.
I have also learnt so much from brokers themselves too, and it is with their feedback that we have been able to keep improving our offering. Without it, my team and I would not have been able to lift this brand to where it is today.
