Fordham officially started working for NatWest in February and said in that time, he noticed the lender was renowned for its flexible approach. 

He said NatWest was “less binary” when it came to criteria, lending and some of the circumstances it was willing to consider. 

“That gives brokers that little bit of flexibility when recommending NatWest to their clients”, he added. 

He also said NatWest had consistency in its approach, as it was “always on, from a pricing perspective”. 

Fordham said: “Generally, we’re always priced relatively well and that’s certainly helped the bank grow from where it was a few years ago.” 

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Fordham added: “As we stand today, [NatWest] is one of the biggest lenders in the UK. So, it’s a really positive growth story and they’ve been able to do that around some of that flexibility, consistency of pricing, having expanded some of their propositions as well.” 

He said NatWest was one of the “better lenders” when it came to affordability, which had helped grow its market share. 

  

Easing the process for brokers 

NatWest’s recently launched broker platform had “gone down really well”, Fordham said, and made it simpler for advisers to submit business. 

He said prior to joining the lender, a lot of time was spent collaborating with brokers and developing different iterations of the platform to make sure it “really fulfilled the needs of brokers and what they want when submitting business to lenders”. 

Fordham said he was also impressed by the NatWest team and their “enthusiasm to make it better for brokers” and ultimately their customers. 

“There’s definitely that culture of success, growth and wanting to make it better and there’s lots of things that that you know we are working on to overall improve the proposition for brokers,” he added. 

Fordham said when he joined NatWest, he spent a lot of time talking to the teams across the UK and wanted to work on a number of areas, including the post-submission process. 

“We have the new portal now, which is great, and that’s enabling us from a technology perspective to look at when brokers submit business to us, how we process that business, how it goes through underwriting, how we agree cases all to basically get a decision quicker. Ultimately we’re trying to agree more cases at first touch.” 

He said NatWest was testing certain parts of the process to improve the packaging requirements and the information provided at submission. 

Fordham said this would be part of an education piece, which would make submissions simpler. 

NatWest welcomes feedback on its proposition through regular surveys with brokers. 

“It’s an ongoing journey,” he added. 

  

Strengthening relationships and offering reliability 

NatWest is considered as “reliable, consistent and flexible” in the minds of brokers, Fordham said, and upholding this reputation is part of what’s driving the lender to improve its broker portal and refreshing its business development management (BDM) team. 

“Brokers want immediacy in my view. If [they] want to understand the point of policy, [they] want to know the answer quickly and [they] want it to be accurate,” he added, “whether that’s with a call or via live chat, [brokers] want to make sure [they] get that information so they can go and advise their client.” 

NatWest is multi-skilling its BDM team to improve that immediacy, Fordham said. 

He said for some brokers, having a BDM was an “emotive subject” and possibly “a status thing”, saying it was sometimes seen as the be all, end all adding that some brokers preferred to have a dedicated BDM. However, NatWest is focusing on how to deliver information in a quick and correct manner regardless of how a broker submits a query. 

“We’re keen for our brokers to be able to use different channels to contact us, but making sure that the experience they get is consistent across all those different channels,” he added. 

  

Staying responsible 

For the market to return to levels seen previously, Fordham said there needed to be a lower interest rate environment, as this would mean better affordability and more confidence. 

He predicted rates could fall by late summer. 

Fordham said: “That would be very welcome, because I think it would give that boost of confidence boost to the market.” 

If and when this happens, NatWest will continue to lend responsibly and support the market with a limber approach. 

“I think that’s going to continue to be key as the as the year progresses,” he said. 

 

Brad Fordham, head of mortgage distribution, NatWest Group

Brad has worked in financial services for over 30 years and in mortgages specifically for 15 of those, starting his career at NatWest.

He joined Santander in 1995 and worked in many senior roles across the retail bank before leading Santander for Intermediaries, then assuming responsibility for all distribution channels and subsequently spending time leading the mortgage business in Santander. 

Brad re-joined NatWest in 2024 as head of mortgage distribution.

 

NatWest has partnered with the British Mortgage Awards this year to celebrate the mortgage sector’s standout and most excellent members. As part of the partnership, Mortgage Solutions will be publishing a series of interviews with NatWest’s mortgage team to discuss best practice and the importance of working together for the good of the sector’s shared customers.

This year’s British Mortgage Awards takes place on 4 July, the shortlist has been announced.