Copy article

Brokers - let's talk about broker portals

Journalist: John Fitzsimons, Freelance

ended 28. November 2023

Morning brokers

Last week Natwest launched a new broker portal, which it reckons makes it easier to submit and track applications (https://www.mortgagesolutions.co.uk/news/2023/11/24/natwest-brings-out-updated-broker-portal/)

So we'd love to get your thoughts on broker portals generally:

  • Which lenders have the best portals? Who have the worst?
  • What makes a good portal? What difference does this tech make to your actual workload?
  • How could these portals be improved further? What functionality would make the biggest difference to you and your clients?

 

9 responses from the Newspage community

Copy all

Copy

Editor
Michelle Lawson
Director at Lawson Financial
Many of the lender portals just appear to be a revamp of a previous offering. All brokers ask is for lenders to make it easy for us to do business with them so it needs to be just that- simple. If we can upload documents to case, communicate with underwriters to add case notes, view and download documents and make amendments this is great. An accurate case tracker too is always useful which would avoid lengthy call waiting times.
Copy

Editor
Darryl Dhoffer
Founder at The Mortgage Geezer
Best lender portals include Santander, Nationwide, Halifax and HSBC - all with intuitive interfaces, real-time updates, transparent communication and detailed case tracking. Other portals that could do with some improvements include TSB and Barclays - slow performance, outdated interface and with Barclays frustrating to use with technical issues. Improvements could include AI automated underwriting, mobile optimization for on-the-go access and case management, more lender CRM integration for unified customer data and interactions
Copy

Premium
Benjamin Blyth
Director at Houz Mortgages
It's amazing how lenders only seem to look internally when they launch new portals - and proceed to tell brokers how great they are/will be.

No. We will be the judge of that, the ones that use them day in, day out!

MSO is a strong reliable system used by a number of lenders but personally, I think Nationwide and HSBC have some of the best portals as they make life easy to make post-offer changes - crucial in the current 'daily rate change' environment.

The smaller building society portals are the most painful to use with really limited functionality. I'm specifically talking about the ones powered by Mutual Vision... Unfortunately of course budget constraints restrict most of these lenders from improving things.

It's surely a matter of time before the likes of SmartrFit can offer lenders a solution and that will be great news for everybody, if adopted.

That said, portal or no portal, it all falls down if a lender's internal processes are clunky, disjointed and slow.
Copy

Jamie Thompson
Mortgage Broker at Jamie Thompson Mortgages
NatWest’s new portal lacks some basic features. Notably the ability to copy the same address for applicant two that was put in for applicant one. This means for a remortgage case I’m typing the same address 3 times, which should be just one. It actually takes me longer with their new system than their old to key an AIP. However, their new system does produce a property AIP certificate which is a great improvement from before, but this was far overdue.
Platform, sorry, Co-Op’s new system is awful. Somehow it’s worse than their old system, ‘Click.’ It’s not producing ESISs or application summaries for me and nobody there can help me get one, despite asking many times.
The best system out these is MSO which is used by TSB, Accord, Principality, and a few more. It’s so easy to use. I wish all lenders would use it. I might run for PM in next year’s election just so I can bring this in to law.
Copy

Rhys Schofield
Brand Director at Peak Mortgages and Protection
All brokers want a portal that's easy to use for brokers and admins. Many brokers favourite is the off-the-shelf version used by Leeds, Accord and TSB that ticks those boxes nicely. I always have had a soft spot for Halifax's mortgage sales platform because it feels like an old friend, and I know brokers pray for the day that Barclays get something that doesn't require a PHD in astrophysics to understand.
Copy

Charles Breen
Founder at C B
The best portals are the simplest, you can tell when a lender has put thought into a portal and invested in it by how simple it is, only asking the questions that are relevant and pertinent, a lot of the smaller building societies have clunky overly complicated systems asking every possible question from what the client ate for breakfast last Tuesday. These are usually the lenders who then will want you to repeat all the information again within underwriting creating needless bottlenecks and duplication. A lot of the systems feel like they have had no broker input in their flow or how they work and its purely built by coding boffins.
Halifax, Accord and TSB’s systems are very good as they only ask the pertinent questions while there is a special place in hell for the people who created their systems.
Copy

Peter Stamford
Mortgage Expert at Stamford Home Finance
Top 3 things I hope for in an Intermediaries Portal - 1. Log In: I'm not a fan of the three letters from a memorable word format. Additional pin numbers are frustrating too. Keep it simple and put two-factor authentication emails in for protection. - 2. Data pull-through: Please don't make me enter the address etc over and over and over. - 3. Document uploading: There is no excuse in this day and age to make Brokers upload one document at a time. Let me batch upload and then state what each PDF is afterwards.

Bonus - Portal MUST be browser-based. Nobody wants to download an app. Looking at you Virgin/Clydesdale
Copy

James Bull
Mortgage Broker at JB Mortgages
A good lender portal allows brokers to key decisions in principles and applications quickly, allows brokers to upload documents easily, and gives fast decisions. It is also helpful if brokers can make amendments to applications after they have been submitted. Natwest's new portal now gives out decision-in-principle certificates which is a welcome improvement. An increasing number of lenders are using the MSO software which ticks a lot of the aforementioned boxes.
Copy

Austyn Johnson
Founder at Mortgages For Actors
The best portals are the ones that are quick. Some portals take 20-30 seconds to load the next page which can put 20-30 mins on the application. And when it comes to uploading docs, a drag-and-drop bin is always the best rather than a single upload. Personally, I love the Landbay portal.