PSIS starts using brokers

The trial began in January in the Wellington region using two groups of brokers, Approved Mortgage Brokers and Property Pack.

"It’s only in its early stages, but we’ve had a number of applications and it’s looking promising," Mayne says. About a third of applications are coming from existing PSIS customers, he says.

While PSIS has 28 offices nationwide, it is using Wellington as a test market. "We’ve taken the approach that we want to control it first to see whether or not it’s going to be worth our while to support it throughout the country," he says.

Mayne says his firm had spent some time investigating the Wellington broker market before choosing its two partners. The fact that both are Mortgage Brokers Association members was a major factor in the decision.

Property Pack had previously approached PSIS and the company had had satisfactory dealings with it while Approved Mortgage Brokers presented PSIS with good references from satisfied customers.

"They had obviously established a good level of client satisfaction and they also had the necessary coverage in the Wellington market."

The company may include other brokers at a later stage.

One thing PSIS wants to prevent is having unassociated brokers telling people they act on behalf of the company.

"We want it to be clearly known who’s acting for us," Mayne says.

Since PSIS added fixed-rate home loans to its existing floating rate product, its lending book has grown from $392 million at the end of March 2001 to $460 million. The bulk of lending is on home loans.

Although it began life as the Public Service Investment Society, membership is no longer restricted to public servants and it offers a full range of banking services to individuals including, telephone, Internet, ATM and Eftpos services.

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