The week that was the 21st September

Afternoon All ,

Hope you are all well .

Firstly , an exercise in IRONY …. For whilst the participants in last Sunday’s London Marathon kept on running on and on , many of our motor cars were consigned to our forecourts via a weekend of no fuel !

Stilll there should be plenty of rocket fuel for when 90 year old William Shatner (Captain Kirk) finally gets to blast off into space for real next week ! … and talking of space, the stars had yet another chance to dazzle here on earth as the long awaited “No Time to Die” finally premiered with Billie Eilish, Emma Raducanu and Kate and Will’s all enjoying a good old night out !

And just like the Bond Premier , things were also looking shaken and stirred here at MF in Week 39 , for you completed 89 cases for £28,567,619 of lending – not bad at all for the tail end of the summer holiday season with many of you also taking your first week- long breaks without having to pay a fortune for them on school term prices.

Further irony therefore , and very apt this week that in first place was surely the very next Bond- in- waiting , our very own stylish and sophisticated Mr “Nice” Mike Atkinson who completed a majestic £2,625,020 of lending across 6 cases. Our 007 was followed by dapper duo, Mark Nathan with £2,343,050 of lending across 6 cases and Simon Holdsworth with £2,180,999 across 2 cases. Mark Nathan also won the “Big Time Bond” Award this week for his £1,802,753 case with Virgin Money.

Moving on to this week’s additional stars in terms of case volume and value we had regal performances from our very own Bond Girl, Laura Sayers. And Nick Harris ( surely a shoe-in for the kick-ass Bond Style villian) also put in a noteworthy performance whilst Raff Federico, James Cosgove, Ian Broadrick, Zak Abdul Karim, and Ajay Sharma all put in strong supporting act performances.

Further , in a week when two of our pesky bleeders were out warming up for the Pebble Beach Classic , it was much to their villainous and wolfish shame and relief that some folk in their Midlands footprint were thankfully at their desk and putting in a shift ; Step forwardClaire Hutchinson , Jaime Lines and further up the A38 , Laura Mitchell who between them birdied a dozen cases and had an aggregate scorecard of lending totalling £2m quid. No clumsy three-putts or Bloxwich GC shouts of Fore there …. ‘’

On the lender side you once again completed the greatest number of caases this week with Santander totalling 16 for £5,980,727 of lending.

Protection – Week 39

Another great week on the Protection side of the business with 53 cases completed this week of which the ‘appy ammer Warren Middleton secured 9 and Kevin Gronow, 7.

Jo Zeff secured the highest policy amount this week for £445,999 with Zurich Assurance and on the provider side you secured the greatest number of deals overall with L&G.

Management & Member Notices

Four notices for club members this week , three of which are complimentary and one of which we’re afraid isn’t.

First the good news items.

1. Hearty CONGRATULATIONS to our crew of Peaky Blinders in Bloxwich near Birmingham who successfully completed a re-location exercise last week. Mortgage Force West Midlands have been with us for over 6 years now and their growth has been simply staggering , such that a team now comprising 8 people help to place over 500 mortgages a year. Below are some pictures from their move and you will see that they have rightly placed The Villain ( Gouldilocks ) in a David Blaine style box of isolation , on account of telling bad jokes and not washing up his crockery

Also pictured is local ‘’ Boss of Bosses ‘’ , Giancarlo Yates and his occasionally-deployed Irishman waste management consultant .

2 At the opposite end of the growth scale, it was a also case of Double Congratulations to two of our recent fast-starters ….

Both of Lorraine Standring and Rebecca Hadley joined with high expectations given their respective credentials & each completed their first application and Factfinds last week.

This East Midlands dream duo are pictured below.

3. Our Recruitment shows no signs of abating and next week I hope to have some really exciting news re 2 new Surrey based superstars joining from a rival estate agency firm. But ahead of that our East Anglian partners have welcomed their own new recruit in Shannon Everill ( pictured above ). Shannon is an experienced practitioner , a very talented lady , and numbered amongst several very

interesting hobbies , she once competed in body building contests . ( … MF HQ has always felt that too much of any remedial & corrective action ever needed over in East Anglia falls upon poor Carrie , so it’s good that she can now call upon Shannon as back-up to keep any unruly male elements of that exceptional team in check and within the rules …. & that includes you Roger !! lol )

4. SAYING “ NO ” TO CLIENTS AND INTRODUCERS / COLLECTIVE RESPONSIBILITY / OVER-FAMILIARITY

To a very infrequent sore matter for us.

This is something few of us enjoy doing. But it’s something which I am afraid more of us need to start practising.

In recent weeks ( and despite Chris’ pleas for vigilance and disclosure ) we have seen an increase in suspicious case activity (or at worst, just rank naivety) from as many as half a dozen brokers ( ! )

The most recent case saw an experienced and long serving broker de-panelised by a lender (Accord , who have very sophisticated detection instrumentation).

Only because of Walter and mine’s relationship with Accord was a worse outcome avoided. ie Everybody either de-panelled , or placed on a Watch List of some kind. At most other networks , such an individual is terminated immediately, even if

( as in this case ) , fraud is not proven , but only SUSPECTED . And that’s the point , as Chris often says …it ONLY ever needs to be SUSPETCED .

So this is our last request for co-operation and empathy on this subject, with the following thoughts to be committed to daily routines;

If a friend (or a friend of a friend ) , or even a family member , wants your assistance , please take extra care. In 95% of cases such folk will honestly disclose all of the material points , but 1 in 20 such cases may feature somebody over-stepping the bounds of familiarity with you. Please check such cases for plausibility of incomes and positions etc even more thoroughly than you might already screen a routine 3rd party introduction.

Remember, most of you have worked in Bancassurance at some point. Put yourself in the position of the actual underwriter and try to challenge any inconsistencies and income abnormalities.

In summary, try not to put your career (and that of others) at undue risk. You all now have ‘’ skin in the game’’ so to speak , and reputations to uphold etc . The management team itself are the ones with their names ‘’ above the door ‘’ , and three of us have over 100 years’ experience now in this industry . Put simply , we are no longer prepared to put that at risk because somebody is choosing to be either complacent or greedy . ( …. What’s always surprising is that these infractions NEVER feature any of our 16 female brokers , and are rarely seen with rookies or brokers on a breadline. Quite the opposite, they are more common with long- standing brokers who already earn a good living - so they are either being totally avaricious , or over-familiar …. clearly incapable of saying “No” to certain clients. )

Suffice to say, nobody would be above a termination from us , regardless of their tenure or potency. ( We owe that commitment to you each of you all, to protect you all . )

‘’ The tail wags the dog ‘’ is a common internal FCA expression on Risk Reports when mis-selling or fraud occurs. But it is not going to become a recurring feature here ie.

Don’t let your client be the tail , and we likewise will not let pushy or perennially exception -seeking brokers become the tail either .

( The feeling here at HQ is that just because somebody has joined M’force virtue of an initially supportive ‘ exemption ‘ being made in some way , that broker then assumes that exceptions for him or her can become the norm .

Even if we weren’t hurtling towards our 100 broker cap , and let’s say this business only had 30 brokers , we would not be accepting the present level of exceptions occurring . But on the point of the present Growth rate , it actually renders ( all of ) us even more susceptible to an FCA inspection and field visit at some point in 2022 < when we are being told that the FCA field force teams will be back on the road with fresh post-pandemic vigour ! > )

The final word , and apologies for the quasi ‘ sermon ‘ folks ….. if in doubt on a case’s hygiene factors , always call a member of the team and we’ll try to assess the case impartially and of course say “ No thanks ” if indeed that is what is needed.

Outwith that , Well Done again on a great week .

This Club really does have a fantastic , professional and varied membership and some industry-leading brokers , and we will do our best to safeguard that excellent reputation at all times. The individual Misdemeanour and Flight Risk Reserves long in place do help to achieve that , but it would be great if we could achieve that simply because we Know Our Clients and Introducers really well , and sometimes that will mean saying ‘’ No ‘’ to them , especially post-pandemic where sometimes folk are possibly desperate to right a perceived injustice or prejudice. .

KD