The trade body, which represents around 300 financial services institutions including the vast majority of mortgage providers, has rejected calls from a conveyancing regulator to help better inform consumers when they are choosing their solicitor.
From December, conveyancers will need to offer greater transparency of prices, services and quality to prospective customers following a recommendation by the competition regulator.
Speaking last week, the Council of Licenced Conveyancers (CLC) called on lenders and brokers to help it improve consumer understanding of the sector.
CLC director of strategy and external relations Stephen Ward said: “No matter how information is provided to a potential client about price, service and quality of a particular conveyancer, we expect that information to be available.
“So if it is available through a portal that the lender or broker or whoever operates, we would expect that information to be available then, so that can inform the consumer’s choice.”
The Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government is also backing the push for customers to have a more informed decision about the conveyancer they use.
Not lenders’ role
However UK Finance said it did not expect lenders to be informing customers when they choose to use a lender’s panel firm.
A UK Finance spokesperson told Mortgage Solutions: “It is not the role of the lender to provide information on conveyancer quality.
“Independent schemes for conveyancer accreditation already exist through legal regulators; we believe this is the appropriate mechanism.”