Industry must stop navel gazing

Finance Brokers Association of Australia (FBAA) managing director Peter White AM says the industry should stop chest beating about its market share, and declared that his focus was on continuing to advance the sector, push for the changes that matter, and continue direct advocacy.

He said the recent misinformed publicity in the Australian Financial Review about finance and mortgage brokers was an “own goal” as the original article was partly based on figures from within the industry.

“While a strong market share shows that consumers trust brokers, the continual public references and updates to the percentage of our market share and financial earnings sends the message that we are focused on ourselves,” he said.

“We look like a bunch of self-indulgent fat cats bragging about how great we are, yet in reality most brokers are small businesspeople who work hard to serve their clients.

“The FBAA celebrates those brokers who are very successful but equally works to help the many who earn a solid but average income.”

He said his focus is on the issues that matter like the continued fight to reform clawbacks, and ensuring that the sector retained the trust of government, regulators and consumers.

Mr White pointed to research late last year by Agile Market Intelligence in association with the FBAA that revealed 86 per cent of mortgage broker clients trusted their broker, and 83 per cent of mortgage broker clients stated they would continue to turn to a broker for assistance with their next mortgage application.

“But we can’t take this trust for granted, because we know the big banks are right now trying to undermine our sector in some ways.”

“We don’t advance our industry or help ourselves retain trust by gloating publicly about how great we are, and as we recently saw, it can backfire and be weaponised against us,” he said.

“We should leave the celebrating to our conferences and awards nights.”