FR: Tell us a little bit about your background and the TMG Network?
I started in financial services back in 2007 at Norton Finance and have spent pretty much my entire career in mortgages, specialist lending and distribution.
Over the years I’ve worked across different parts of the market, but what I’ve always been most interested in is how you build a business that genuinely works for brokers rather than expecting brokers to fit around the business.
I became CEO of TMG Mortgage Network in 2022 and since then we’ve grown significantly, both in terms of adviser numbers and the volume of business being written through the network.
But for me, growth isn't simply about putting more advisers on a spreadsheet. I’d rather have 300 productive, engaged advisers who believe in what we're building than chase headcount for the sake of saying we’re the biggest.
Our focus has been on creating the infrastructure around brokers that allows them to spend more time advising clients and less time fighting systems, chasing payments or dealing with unnecessary administration.
That means investing in technology, compliance, relationships with lenders and providers, training and development, and importantly, people.
We’ve tried to build TMG around a relatively straightforward philosophy: if our brokers grow, we grow.
FR: Your network uses One Mortgage System (OMS) as its CRM, how important has that decision been to the growth of TMG and what advice would you give to brokers when choosing a CRM system?
Technology has been massively important to our growth, and OMS has become a central part of the infrastructure behind TMG.
As we've grown, the biggest challenge isn't necessarily generating more business – it's making sure the operational side of the business can keep pace with that growth.
You can't realistically scale a network with hundreds of advisers if everything requires manual intervention.
For us, OMS has allowed us to keep developing processes around one core system, whether that's submissions, compliance, payments, protection, reporting or integrations with other technology.
We've recently committed to OMS for another five years, which probably demonstrates better than anything how important we see that relationship being to the next stage of TMG's growth.
My advice to brokers choosing a CRM would be don't simply choose the system with the longest list of features.
Look at what you actually do every day. How many clicks does it take to complete a case?
Can information flow through the system without being entered three different times?
Can it integrate with the other technology you use?
Can your administrators, advisers and compliance team all work from the same information?
And probably most importantly: will the technology provider continue investing in the product?
Changing your CRM once your business has grown is painful, so you're not just choosing software for the business you have today. You're choosing infrastructure for the business you want to have in three, five or even ten years.
The best technology should almost disappear into the background. It should remove work rather than create more of it.
That's ultimately what we look for at TMG – technology that gives our brokers more time to speak to customers and build their businesses, because that's where the real value is.
FR: What single piece of technology do you wish lenders would prioritise over the next 12 months to make your working life easier?
For me, it is proper real-time case tracking with meaningful updates, so not just 'case received' or 'under review', as brokers need to know where the case actually is, what has been checked, what is outstanding, what the likely next step is, and whether anything is going to delay the offer.
Brokers don’t expect lenders to be perfect, and we understand underwriting has to be done properly, but what creates frustration is uncertainty. If a broker has clear, accurate information, they can manage the client, manage expectations and stop unnecessary chasing.
The lenders that get this right will and do win broker confidence very quickly.
FR: What part of the current lender application journey most needs modernisation?
The biggest area is the post-submission journey. A lot of work has gone into sourcing, affordability and decision-in-principle journeys, but once the application is submitted, in many cases it still feels too manual and too unclear.
The modernisation needs to be around underwriting transparency, document requirements, valuation updates, offer conditions and solicitor progress. That is where the client anxiety builds and where brokers spend the most time chasing. The broker should be able to see exactly what is happening and what needs doing next, as I mentioned earlier. At the minute, too much of the process still relies on phone calls, live chats, emails and worst of all, assumptions.
FR: Are lenders innovating in the right areas, or are they missing the mark on what brokers actually need?
I think lenders are innovating, and we should give credit where it is due. There has been a lot of progress around affordability calculators, product transfers, criteria tools and digital upload systems.
But I do think sometimes the industry gets excited by technology that looks impressive, while brokers are still asking for the basics to work better. Brokers do not need flashy tech, they need reliable tech. They need systems that reduce duplication, give clear updates, make criteria easier to understand and stop them having to rekey the same information multiple times.
So I would say lenders are moving in the right direction, but the real opportunity is to build technology around the broker’s working day, not just around the lender’s internal process.
FR: Which manual tasks in lender processes feel the most outdated or unnecessary and how can lenders reduce anxiety for clients during the mortgage journey through smarter tech?
The most outdated thing is brokers having to provide the same information again and again in different formats. We key it into our CRM, key it into sourcing, key it into lender portals, upload documents, then sometimes answer the same questions again through messages or calls.
Document requests can also feel outdated when they are not specific. A generic request for bank statements or income proof is fine, but if the underwriter needs something particular, tell us exactly what and why. That avoids delays and avoids clients being asked for things more than once.
The biggest thing is clarity to reduce anxiety. Clients get anxious when they do not know what is happening, especially when they have found a property, paid fees, instructed solicitors and started emotionally planning the move.
Smarter tech could give brokers better milestone updates, clearer expected timescales and automatic alerts when something changes. That then allows the broker to be proactive with the client.
But I would be careful here. I do not think lenders should replace the broker relationship with direct-to-client technology. The broker is the trusted adviser. The technology should empower the broker to give a better service, not bypass them. The best journey is where the lender, broker, solicitor and client are all aligned, but the broker remains at the centre, managing the advice and the relationship.
FR: What emerging technology has the greatest potential to transform the mortgage process?
I think AI and open banking together have the biggest potential. Open banking can give a much clearer picture of income, spending, commitments and affordability, while AI can help interpret data quicker, spot missing information, flag potential issues and support underwriting.
But the important point is that technology should support better advice, not replace advice. A mortgage is not just a product. It sits alongside protection, household budgeting, family planning, debt, future moves, remortgage strategy and long-term financial wellbeing.
That is where brokers need to become more holistic. If technology can remove the admin and speed up the process, brokers can spend more time doing what clients actually need from us such as giving proper advice, identifying risks, explaining options and making sure the mortgage is part of a bigger financial plan.
So for me, the future is not lender tech versus brokers. It is lender tech making brokers better, faster and more valuable to the client.
