JLM Mortgage Services, the mortgage and protection network, has launched the first stage of its robo-mortgage advice proposition.
The Virtual Adviser service – which can be accessed via www.jlmmortgages.co.uk - has been designed to provide JLM advisers with a robo-advice proposition that can be marketed to their existing clients and potential new customers.
Virtual Adviser allows clients seeking residential or buy-to-let mortgage advice to research the range of potential mortgage options available to them without the need to register any initial details.
At first, Virtual Adviser takes the client through some initial steps regarding their needs and works through the responses to provide some indicative product details that the client might be eligible for.
The client is provided with these product details for illustrative purposes and no advice is delivered at this stage.
Users can have a mortgage illustration in their inbox in five minutes by completing the simple, three-stage process that filters down to more specific details to refine the product list.
At the end of this part of the process, the client can then either choose to stay online with the Virtual Adviser, providing further details in order to secure a more specific quotation, or they can choose to speak to a JLM adviser directly.
Providing more information to the Virtual Adviser, for example, income and outgoing financial information allows it to provide a more tailored and specific range of product options for the client, plus it enables the system to collate all the information necessary to provide a mortgage illustration.
Again, the client can choose to continue this process online or speak directly to a JLM adviser.
JLM also offer a live chat facility via its website, which allows customers to exchange messages directly with an adviser online in order to take them through their mortgage enquiry.
Rory Joseph, director of JLM Mortgage Services, said: “For all the talk of the robo-advice threat to advisers, we are of the opinion that we as an industry need to embrace the technology and that, done correctly, it actually provides a major opportunity for established firms, not just the online technology firms who see the opportunity in our sector but have little mortgage advice experience.
"For us, Virtual Adviser is another string to the bow in providing an all-encompassing service to customers. This is not about replacing advisers, far from it, it is about helping advisers access clients in a variety of ways.
"It is very important that we recognise the varying ways clients want to engage with their advice needs and to provide them with the tools to begin arranging their mortgage at a time which suits them, not just when it is convenient for us as the adviser."
JLM's launch comes after digital mortgage broker Hoocht pledged back in October to provide the 'fastest-ever' mortgage application process lasting a total of just 15 minutes.
Hoocht is a real-time mortgage advice platform using chatbots to handle customer conversations, which are followed by automatically-generated mortgage and borrowing capacity illustrations.
Customers are then passed to Hoocht's brokers for mortgage advice via online chat to help them make their final decision.
The Hull-based fintech firm claimed its artificial intelligence technology makes applying for a mortgage 'as quick and easy as online shopping'.
emma.hughes@ft.com
