Bank of Ireland’s head of intermediaries Iain Smith is ‘open to new opportunities’ on Linkedin following a consultation with sales staff including the broker-facing team.
The consultation within the mortgage business and field sales team concluded at the end of July and Smith who is on extended leave has no plans to stay, according to sources.
Smith was unavailable to comment and the bank would not be drawn on individual personnel.
The bank restated that there have been no compulsory redundancies and effort has been made to redeploy personnel where possible.
In June, Bank of Ireland (BOI) confirmed it was consulting with a ‘number of sales staff’ which includes its intermediary team in a bid to reduce the field sales team from 17 to 12.
The bank has confirmed closure of its Post Office for Intermediaries brand to new applications on 9 July with all new business offered through the Bank of Ireland for Intermediaries channel.
The Post Office will continue to offer mortgages through its direct channels.
In April 2018, Bank of Ireland launched the Post office for Intermediaries brand to sit alongside Bank of Ireland for Intermediaries and launched two intergenerational products to offer a solution to first-time buyers and also solve the later life lending conundrum.
In June, the Irish government launched a ‘phased exit’ over 2021 of its 13.9 per cent stake in Bank of Ireland worth roughly £676m, owned since the credit crunch bailout.
Victoria Hartley is contributing editor at Mortgage Solutions, Specialist Lending Solutions, Your Money and Your Mortgage at London-based publishing company AE3 Media.
She has an MA in Radio from Goldsmiths after gaining a 2:1 in a Comparative American Studies BA at Warwick University. She also holds a TEFL qualification and taught overseas in Mexico and Japan from 1994 to 1997.
Her role includes editorial oversight of the news, analysis and features, event content management and strategic and editorial consultancy for the AE3 Media group. She is an experienced video, broadcast and live-event host and regularly chairs web and podcast debates and interviews.
Multiple award nominations have resulted in two wins: Santander Media Awards, trade journalist of the year and Headlinemoney Awards, mortgage journalist of the year (B2B). Here is one of the award-winning pieces: https://www.mortgagesolutions.co.uk/news/2011/07/21/exclusive-tale-bailey-fraud-witness/
Previous roles include editorships of Mortgage Solutions, consumer title What Mortgage and trade title Credit Today as well as a stint freelancing for a variety of outlets including The Guardian and Which? Money.
