Interest rate worries are making the phones ring

The Bank of England has warned that households are facing the worst fall in living standards since records began more than 30 years ago, thanks to interest rate rises.

Related topics:  Blogs,  Mortgages
Louise Wilson | Moneypenny
28th February 2022
Louise Wilson Moneypenny
"Economic uncertainty makes the phone ring. We saw it during the pandemic and with the interest rate rises, we expect the phones to keep on ringing."

With media headlines highlighting the rising cost of food and fuel and the ‘eat or heat’ plight faced by many, it’s not surprising that many homeowners will be facing very real financial uncertainty.

Whether they’re worried about the impact this has on their existing mortgage or their ability to get their first or a new one – these anxieties are already translating into a much greater volume of calls to mortgage brokers and lenders.

Let me share six useful strategies to help brokers and lenders provide the very best care for worried customers.

1. Dedicated support. The pandemic made financial businesses realise the importance of improved accessibility and the need to offer extra support during times of uncertainty. Put dedicated telephone support in place to help customers facing financial difficulties – this could be a specific helpline number, or the addition of an additional IVR option to ensure that key calls are directed to the right people quickly.

2. Do an empathy check. The people answering your calls need to have empathy. In times of worry people want to feel heard, understood and supported. This will likely mean longer call times as people have more to explain and potentially more complex needs. Give your team the bandwidth and skills to support customers fully, rather than rushing them off the phone.

3. Answer calls quickly. When people are anxious, their patience is often compromised. Make sure that calls are answered quickly and put extra resource in place if required, be that in-house or outsourced. Also, remember that customers expect support outside of traditional office hours – so call handling teams should have capacity in the evenings and early mornings too.

4. Consider other tools to help ease the pressure. Not all issues require a phone call and the use of other channels such as live chat can help to triage enquiries quickly and keep volumes away from the phones. Knowledgeable live chat operators will also know how and where to signpost people for help as well as be able to book call-backs for complex matters. 37% of Moneypenny’s chats occur outside traditional hours – which helps to show the increasingly 24/7 demands of customer behaviour. Customers appreciate the opportunity to ask quick questions, in real time, whilst browsing online. Others simply prefer not to talk on the phone and favour the messenger-style experience live chat offers. Live chat offers choice.

5. Create helpful content. Many of your customers’ calls will be around similar themes – perhaps with themes such as ‘I’m worried I won’t be able to make my mortgage payment’, ‘how will affordability criteria change because of the interest rate rise?’ and ‘how can I move to a fixed rate mortgage quickly?’. Choose the most commonly asked questions and create easy-to-follow website content to provide the answers. This will help customers to self-serve and provide live chat teams with helpful content to signpost people too.

6. Get ahead of the curve. Times of customer worry present an opportunity to get ahead. Consider investing in outbound activity with courtesy calls to customers that you think might require extra help or reassurance. It may be timely to revisit customers who had struggles during the pandemic, or useful to warm-up remortgage data sooner than usual. If in-house teams aren’t able to take on the extra work, use outsourced support to provide the initial contact and book follow-up calls.

Economic uncertainty makes the phone ring. We saw it during the pandemic and with the interest rate rises, we expect the phones to keep on ringing. Brokers and lenders need to ensure their customer care is on point – done well and it’s real chance to crate meaningful customer relationships, solve potential issues quickly and build loyalty. Done badly and customers will be left confused, vulnerable and potentially defaulting on payments, pausing deals or looking elsewhere for support.

For brokers and lenders struggling to resource these peaks of demand, outsourced telephone answering and live chat support can provide a very valuable and timely addition to customer service operations.

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