A recent report suggested that brokers were missing out on over £20,000 in commission fees each year by neglecting their protection proposition.
Mortgage Solutions asked mortgage brokers to say the percentage of their clients they also sell protection when placing a mortgage case, with 35% of voters saying that they sell protection in less than half of their cases.
In total, 65% of respondents said they would sell protection products to over half of their mortgage clients.
Brendan Farrell, broker at Farrell Independent, told Mortgage Solutions that advisers converting low levels of mortgage cases into protection sales were missing out on a valuable slice of the market.
“It amazes me in this day and age that so many brokers don’t touch protection, we try to do it with every deal we process.
“Protection is so important, we close around 50% of our mortgages cases with protection attached and we try to have it all in place by the time we complete the mortgage.”
Farrell added that customers were often confused by the different protection packages on offer and needed the help of an adviser to broach the subject and help them choose which products they require.
“Consumers like to think they’re clued up, but they often just think cheapest is best. They’ve seen price comparison websites, where you can compare certain products, but we offer multi-benefit plans to get a clients a better deal and we can give them the advice they actually need.
“It’s still unusual for anyone to come up to us and say they want insurance. Although last week we had clients come to us from another mortgage broker who wouldn’t offer protection so that they could complete an insurance deal with us.
“Obviously we’d have loved to have completed the mortgage as well but in two years’ time hopefully that client will come and get everything from us.”
