HSBC Australia: No return to broker market

HSBC Australia does not believe it can add value to customers via mortgage brokers and has no plans to return to the third party channel.

This was the view expressed by Graham Heunis, head of personal financial services at HSBC Australia, speaking on a panel discussion at the Retail Financial Services Forum today.

Heunis said it was not possible for HSBC to be a trusted advisor while working through intermediaries.

HSBC quit the broker space in December 2006, selling its broker originated residential mortgage book to FirstMac and Heunis said the bank's position on brokers had not changed.

"We exited the broker market because we did not believe we could add value to customers through brokers," he said.

"It's not an area we want to play in and we have no intention to do so," he added.

However, fresh from acquiring the mortgage management and aggregators businesses from Challenger, John Flavell head of sales at NAB Broker, hit back, saying it was up to the lender to enable brokers to become the trusted advisors and build great relationships with customers.

Ian Corfield, chief executive of retail at BankWest, backed Flavell, saying regulation would help deal sort out this issue: 'Some of the advice has been poor, but there are also some fantastic broker businesses out there," he said.

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