The Mortgage Lender
The Mortgage Lender needed to deliver remote services to their customers during the challenging circumstances of the Coronavirus lock down.
DELIVERING BUSINESS CONTINUITY AT SPEED
With the sudden announcement of restricted working conditions due to the Covid-19 crisis, The Mortgage Lender’s priorities were to keep its people safe and healthy while continuing to provide the levels of service its customers were used to.
Planning was already well underway, however the company had to implement business continuity plans and IT resilience at a scale and speed that was previously unexpected.
The goal was to introduce home working for field teams and onsite underwriters, protecting staff and broker partners. Mobile teams had to be able to continue to offer timely and regular contact to the customers that The Mortgage Lender supports.
0 %
increase in loans administered in 2020
£ 0 bn
decisions in principle on mortgage applications in 2020
0 %
increase in staff to deal with demand following lockdown
challenge
The Mortgage Lender’s IT team and technology partners regularly review and test its business continuity plans – including the capability for home working. Like almost every organization in the UK however, the idea of the entire company working remotely wasn’t considered likely.
The uncertain economic conditions in the country also added to the demanding situation with many people losing their regular income. There was a huge increase in the number of calls from borrowers concerned about making their next mortgage payments. Remote connectivity to financial services applications, telephony, and back-office systems had to be implemented for all employees enabling them to work without interrupting service.
SOLUTION
The capacity of existing internet connectivity was soon under severe pressure. To prevent any reduction in service levels, Tectrade and The Mortgage Lender immediately designed a new connectivity solution with increased capacity.
A short-term workaround was provided by increasing capacity on an existing shared SSL VPN link to the production data center. While this approach securely segregates traffic from different organizations, there is a limit on capacity.
Within days, Tectrade had built a new dedicated secure network solution with enough capacity for all employees as well as future expansion. All users were seamlessly migrated from other connections to the new network. Tectrade provided resources to troubleshoot the issues, increased capacity and set up new remote connections.
We now have full work from home capability for all employees without any degradation in service. To turn this around in such as short space of time was an outstanding effort.
David Hood, Head of Technology – The Mortgage Lender
outcomes
In unprecedented conditions, all users that would normally have worked in The Mortgage Lender’s head office were moved to working from home over high performance and secure connections.
The migration was achieved without any loss of service – even with an unusually high volume of calls.
Through the quick action of Tectrade and internal IT teams, The Mortgage Lender is able to serve its customers with advice and where appropriate with special help for those facing difficult circumstances.
About our client
The Mortgage Lender (TML) is an independent provider of mortgages via specialist brokers and intermediaries to the buy-to-let and residential markets.
Regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority, the company must operate with high levels of security and compliance.
In 2020, Shawbrook Bank acquired TML, providing them with funding for its existing specialist, intermediary-only mortgages alongside the ability to expand its product range in the future.
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