Staff at its Lynch Wood site, where the majority of its underwriters are based, have been asked to self isolate after some employees tested positive for the virus. As the employees stay home and the office undergoes a deep clean, the lender has anticipated it will face capacity issues due to the reduced number of underwriters.
The products will be removed today at 8pm and any full mortgage applications for existing products must be submitted before then.
Agreements in principle (AIP) submitted by the deadline which have been referred will be honoured on the selected mortgages even if they have been accepted after the withdrawal.
Jeremy Duncombe (pictured), Accord’s managing director, said: “Our priority has always been the health and wellbeing of our colleagues, so we have taken the decision to withdraw products at 75 per cent and 80 per cent LTV to ensure service levels can be managed with our reduced capacity.
“Whilst we are doing everything we can to minimise the impact to service, in these exceptional circumstances with less underwriters available, there are likely to be some delays, so we advise brokers to check the current turnaround times on our website in order to manage client expectations.
“We expect this to be a very temporary pause on lending at these tiers and are still accepting applications on all other products within our range,” he added.
