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Know Your BDM: Simon Kimber, Coventry for Intermediaries

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  • 21/01/2019
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Know Your BDM: Simon Kimber, Coventry for Intermediaries
This week Mortgage Solutions is speaking with Simon Kimber, business development manager at Coventry for Intermediaries.

 

How many brokers and broker firms do you cover in your role?

I look after our brokers in and around Kent, which involves quite a few miles.

 

How do you successfully organise and manage business on a daily basis?

I try to minimise the time I spend in the car by grouping my meetings by location and making the most of my time between meetings. Providing a good service to our brokers is key and if I can’t get to my phone it will be answered by our dedicated support team so brokers don’t have to wait.

 

What do you wish brokers understood about your job?

I think brokers sometimes think that all we do is go to meetings, but just like them we need to stay up to date with the mortgage market and our own products and services. Perhaps the best tip to brokers is to provide as much detail on a case as they can, as this helps us make quicker decisions and get their clients’ cases moving.

 

What do you think is the most important attribute in a good BDM?

Obviously we need to be organised and efficient in responding to queries. We need to be good at listening and knowledgeable too so we can deliver the right solutions and, of course, honest and straightforward.

 

When you’re unavailable to contact via telephone, what’s the second-best way for brokers to get in touch?

If you call me and I can’t answer it’ll divert to our BDM support team, so brokers’ calls will always be answered. Each broker also has a dedicated telephone BDM, whose details can be found through our BDM finder tool on our website.

 

What issues come up time and time again?

Brokers want us to talk to them about more complex cases which we are happy to do. It’s always great when we can help with these.

 

If you were head of the FCA for the day, what would you change about regulation in the mortgage industry?

I don’t think I’d make any changes actually – a bit of stability would be welcomed by all I think.

 

What was your motivation for choosing business development as a career?

I love working with people and helping to solve problems, so this role seemed like a perfect fit.

 

How do you establish and maintain a good relationship with brokers?

Trust and credibility have to be earned, so I think it’s important to build a rapport with brokers, to listen and deliver the best solution in a timely manner.

 

And how do you establish and maintain good relationships internally?

I keep in touch with the team as much as I can while I’m on the road. We also meet up once a month for a team meeting and we discuss – among other things – who had what at the previous night’s curry.

 

What’s the strangest question you’ve ever been asked?

Would we entertain a re-mortgage with debt consolidation for a 92-year-old?

 

And finally, what did you want to be growing up?

It was my dream to be a striker for Liverpool FC.

 

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