Bath Building Society cuts mortgage range to improve service
Thursday, 20 Mar 2008 16:01
Bath Building Society claims it is cutting its mortgage range in a bid to deal with rising demand and maintain service levels.
Dick Jenkins, Bath chief executive, told BBC Radio 5 Live’s Wake Up to Money this morning that part of its mortgage range had been withdrawn to help process the high number of applications it had received.
He also maintained the society's liquidity position was strong.
"We’ve simply been inundated with mortgage applications and enquiries over the last few days," he said.
"The issue is one of service really – we’re a small society and we want to make sure we can process the volume of applications that we receive.
"Part of our proposition is to make sure that we can give the personal touch and the right level of service to our customers, and if we’re just deluged with applications it’s very difficult to deliver on that proposition.”
Mr Jenkins went on to say smaller building societies were in a good position to profit from the current market uncertainties.
"Small building societies are actually very well positioned to deal with the issue of the credit crunch," he said.
"Our level of funding from other banks is very much smaller…We don’t have the kind of exposure to the US market and the complicated financial instruments that are the hallmark of the credit crunch.
“We don’t have any subprime lending on our books, we haven’t even had a repossession in the last ten years."