Turnaround times continue to trend downward

Large banks continued to improve their turnaround times in March, with Macquarie leading the pack with turnaround time down to two days.

The latest Broker Pulse report, produced by Momentum Media’s research division, Momentum Intelligence, found that turnaround times for the most commonly used banks (defined as “large banks” in the survey) continued to decrease over March, as part of a larger downward trend that has been occurring recently.

According to the 245 residential brokers surveyed between 1 April and 14 April, large authorised deposit-taking institutions (ADIs) continued the strong performance they’ve been displaying since the start of the year.

According to the data, average turnaround times for large ADIs have almost halved since December 2021 - when turnaround times averaged 11 days -  to around six days during March 2022.

Macquarie Bank kept their position as the large ADI with the fastest turnaround time, at two days, followed by Commonwealth Bank with four days. These two large ADIs, as well as Bankwest and Westpac, were the four large ADIs whose turnaround time remained under one week, holding firm on February’s figures.

Another strong performer among large ADIs was ANZ, brokers said, with the major bank’s average turnaround time decreasing to 12 days in March, a 10 day improvement from the average turnaround time during April last year.

The continued decrease in turnaround times has been strongly supported by improved performance of BDMs, which saw their broker rating continue to increase to its highest ever in March, and credit assessors, which recorded its second-highest broker rating in March.

The big four bank has also been benefiting from its technological upgrades following a long period of blown out turnarounds.

ME Bank was among the most improved lenders in terms of speed, hastening their turnaround time from 14 days in February down to six days in March.

Average turnaround time for small ADIs held firm for the second-month in a row at nine days on average, down two days from the 11 days average turnaround time from January 2021.

One of the top performing small ADIs was Auswide Bank, which decreased its average turnaround time from eight days in February to five days in March, while Citibank reduced its average turnaround time from seven days in February to five days in March.

Additionally, average turnaround for non-banks remained at five days for the second consecutive month, the first time average turnaround time has consecutively been five days since November 2021.

Advantedge remained the non-ADI with the fastest turnaround time at three days, closely followed by AFG Home Loans, with the lender reporting an average turnaround time of four days throughout March, down from its peak of nine days, as reported in December 2021.

Original story on The Adviser.

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