Governance

Corporate social responsibility - Doing the right thing in the market place

Lending

Bradford & Bingley's residential lending activity continues to focus on a range of niche areas providing mortgages for individuals who need a more specialist product than those available in the mainstream mortgage market. The three main products are buy-to-let, self-cert and lifetime mortgages.

Buy-to-let

Bradford & Bingley is the market leader in buy-to-let with the largest buy-to-let customer base in the UK, accounting for around 20% of the market.

All of our buy-to-let products offer flexible payment features as an integral part of the mortgage. This enables people to overpay or underpay their mortgage, or even take a payment holiday. This is part of our commitment to understanding our customer needs and responding to changing lifestyles and employment patterns.

Bradford & Bingley's intermediary brand, Mortgage Express, also uses its position as a market leader to publish authoritative reports on confidence in the buy-to-let market and economic outlook reports from its chief economist. Both of these reports are published on our website, www.mortgage-express.co.uk.

We can see that buy-to-let has increased the availability of rental housing stock in the UK, making it easier for people to find affordable decent housing. Bradford & Bingley's product range has been at the forefront of buy-to-let and we intend to keep our market leading position.

Self-cert

Bradford & Bingley's self-cert product range aims to help customers who are finding that their employment patterns are becoming increasingly more diverse and therefore do not fit the requirements of most mainstream high street lenders.

Self-employed customers make up almost 10% of the working population (source: Office of National Statistics) where multiple jobs or income sources and seasonal or short term contracts are common. Part time workers now account for 25% of the total labour force (source: Labour Force Survey).

It is these customers that our self-cert product range is designed to help. With the valuable underwriting experience that we have gained in specialist lending markets, we are able to work with our customers to decide how much they can afford to borrow.

Lifetime

Lifetime mortgages enable homeowners over the age of 60 to release some of the equity they have built up in their properties to enhance their lifestyle in retirement.

Bradford & Bingley is one of the leading lenders in the lifetime mortgage market, sold through our Mortgage Express brand.

Lifetime mortgages are regulated by the FSA and Bradford & Bingley continues to be a member of Safe Home Income Plans ('SHIP') through the Mortgage Express brand.

SHIP is the UK's leading professional body for equity release providers. Launched in 1991, it is dedicated entirely to the protection of borrowers and promotion of safe home income and equity release plans.

In addition to these specialist loans, Bradford & Bingley also has a portfolio of traditional residential mortgages, which are secured on UK residential property and sold through our branch network.

Savings

Bradford & Bingley's branch and third party network offers a very competitive range of deposit based savings and investment products, supported by our online, postal and telephone channels.

In 2007, Bradford & Bingley partnered with the Wallace & Gromit's Children's Foundation to utilise one of their major new characters, Shaun the Sheep, in a range of product initiatives.

The Wallace & Gromit's Children's Foundation is a national charity raising funds to improve the quality of life for children in hospitals and hospices throughout the UK.

The Foundation funds an innovative range of projects to ensure these children have a better, brighter future. Created in 2003, the Foundation has funded projects in 23 hospitals and hospices.

To raise funds for the Foundation, Bradford & Bingley ran a national Shaun the Sheep colouring competition for which Bradford & Bingley made a donation for each entry received. Our branch network continued to sell pin badges and the whole Group took part in the Wallace & Gromit Wrong Trousers Day in June. In 2007, Bradford & Bingley staff and customers raised over £15,000 for the Foundation.

As well as selling mortgages and growing savings balances, the branch network also maintains and develops relationships with our customers. In order to do that, Bradford & Bingley offers a wide choice of highly competitive products from a range of providers including general insurance, wealth and personal loan products, which are provided by third parties.

Investment guidelines

As a primarily residential lender we lend to individuals rather than businesses, so we do not incorporate ethical or environmental criteria over and above legal requirements. For example, not lending to bankrupts nor lending on properties without planning permission or clear legal title.

We seek to be a responsible lender and ensure our credit checking identifies individuals who have the ability to repay the loans and not get into repayment difficulties. Our mortgage products do not offer loan values based on unreasonable multiples of salary.