Credit Guide
Introduction
This Credit Guide (CG) provides you with important information about us and our Credit Representatives, who may provide you with credit services described in the CG.
As well as giving you important information that will help you decide if you want to use any of these services, it provides important information about:
- who we (Licensee and our Representatives) are;
- the credit services we offer to help you evaluate and make an informed decision about whether to use the services described in this CG;
- the remuneration that we and relevant persons receive for the services;
- any arrangements which may influence our services to you;
- our Privacy Statement and
- how we handle your complaints if you are not satisfied with the services provided.
Credit Assistance
Our Credit Representatives are authorised to engage in credit activities including providing credit assistance on behalf of Licensee. They can provide you with the following Credit Assistance:
- Give you information about loan/lease products or related services
- Consider whether you are eligible for a loan or lease or any related service you requested
- Suggest a suitable credit contract, an increase to your credit limit and/or that you retain your existing credit contract
- Assist you to apply for a credit contract or an increase in your credit limit
- Recommend a suitable consumer lease or to retain your existing consumer lease
- Assist you to apply for a consumer lease.
Our Responsible Lending obligations to you
We are obliged to ensure that any loan or increase to a loan we help you to obtain or any lease we help you enter is not unsuitable for you. To decide this, we will need to ask you some questions in order to assess whether the loan or lease is not unsuitable, and within your best interests.
To make this assessment, we must make reasonable enquiries about your objectives and requirements and for the credit contract or credit limit increase. We must also make reasonable enquiries about your financial situation and take reasonable steps to verify this information.
It is important that the information you provide us is accurate, complete and up to date, as if we proceed on incomplete or incorrect information, you may be in breach of your legal obligations to the lender.
We will not be able to give you Credit Assistance if our assessment shows that:
- you will not be able to meet the proposed repayments without substantial hardship, or
- the loan or lease will not meet your objectives and/or requirements.
We will prepare a written Statement of Credit Assistance. You can ask us for a copy of this Statement any time up to seven years after we provide you with Credit Assistance. To request a copy please contact us.
We will provide you with a copy:
- within seven business days after the day we receive your request, provided you make the request within seven years of the date of the Preliminary Assessment, or otherwise
- within 21 business days after the day we receive your request.
We have an obligation under the Anti-Money Laundering and Counter Terrorism Finance Act 2006 to verify your identity and the source of any funds. This means that we will ask you to present identification documents such as passport and driver licence. We will also retain copies of this information. We cannot provide you with Credit Assistance if you are unwilling to provide this information.
Conflicts of Interest / Related Companies
As a client, you may also be referred to any related or other company of which your broker may be a director or representative of, such as Accounting, Financial Planning, Real Estate, Insurance or Property Development. These industries operate under a different authorisation structure and the services provided are distinct from the services provided under mortgage broking. There is no obligation to utilise the referred services offered by your broker and you are welcome to compare services to those in the market prior to making any commitment.
Additionally, we may access various reports via our lenders such as credit or property reports. These services are offered free to brokers and we believe it does not influence our recommendations.
If any potential conflicts are noted during the assessment of the information you provided, these will be outlined on the Statement of Credit Assistance that will be provided to you prior to lodgement of your application to a lender.
Lenders and Lessors
Subject to meeting credit criteria, we will be able to assist you to obtain loans and leases from a broad range of lenders and lessors through our broker group.
The following are the lenders or lessors with which our licensee conducted the most business during 2022/2023: Macquarie, St George; Westpac; NAB, ANZ; Adelaide Bank
The following are the lenders or lessors with which I conducted the most business during 2022/2023: Adelaide Bank; ANZ La Trobe Financial Services; BOM; Pepper; CBA
| LENDERS | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Allium Money (Brighten Home Loans) | First Federal | ME Bank | RACQ (QLD Only) |
| AMFIN | Firstmac | Medfin | Redzed |
| AMP Bank | Funding | Money Place | Resimac |
| ANZ | Gateway Bank | Mortgage Ezy | Salt and Lime |
| Australian Military Bank | Granite Home Loans | Mortgage Mart | Shift |
| Auswide Bank | Great Southern Bank | Move Bank | St George/BOM/Bank SA |
| Bank Australia | Heartland Seniors Finance | My State | Suncorp |
| Bank of China | Hejaz Financial Services | NAB | Thinktank |
| Bank of Sydney | Heritage Bank | Now Finance | TMB/Firefighters/Uni Bank |
| BankVic | Home Affordability Solutions | Oak Capital | UBank |
| Bankwest | IMB (VIC Only) | ORDE Financial | Valiant Finance |
| Bendigo Bank | ING | P&N Bank (WA Only) | Victorian Mortgage Group |
| Better Mortgage Management | Judo | Paramount Mortgages | Virgin Money |
| Beyond Bank Australia | Keystart (WA Only) | Pepper | Westpac |
| Bluebay Home Loans | La Trobe Financial | Pepper Asset | WISR |
| Bluestone Mortgages | Latitude | Plenti (formerly RateSetter) | WLTH |
| BOQ | Liberty Financial | Prime Capital | Zip Business |
| CBA | MA Money | Prospa | 360MMS |
| Community First Bank | Macquarie Bank & Leasing | Qudos Bank |
Our Fees
We may charge a fee for providing Credit Assistance. More detail about those fees will be set out in a Credit Quote we will give to you before we provide you with Credit Assistance.
Other Fees and Charges
You may be charged a lender’s application fee, valuation fees and other fees associated with the loan or lease. These fees are not charged by Purple Circle Financial Services Pty Ltd or our Credit Representative. You should review the disclosure documents and your loan contract or lease for further details of any such fees and charges.
Commissions
Purple Circle Financial Services Pty Ltd has appointed a broker group as our agent to receive commissions from lenders and lessors and to pay Purple Circle Financial Services Pty Ltd commission in relation to loan contracts or leases for which we act as a Credit Representative and provide Credit Assistance. The total amount of commission Purple Circle Financial Services Pty Ltd may receive in relation to your loan or lease may vary depending on the lender or lessor, the term, the features, the amount of the loan or lease you ultimately choose and the amount and timing of the repayments that you make. Some or all of a commission payment received by Purple Circle Financial Services Pty Ltd may be paid to our Credit Representatives.
Loan contracts such as home loans, investment property loans
Upfront commission payable by lenders in relation to loans is calculated as a percentage of the loan amount and is generally in the range of 0.5% and 1% of the loan amount. It is usually paid after settlement of the loan.
Trail commission payable by lenders in relation to loans is generally calculated regularly (monthly, quarterly, bi-monthly or annually) on the outstanding loan balance and is paid in arrears. The trail commission payable by lenders is generally in the range of 0% per annum and 0.30% per annum of the outstanding loan amount.
Personal Loans
Upfront commission payable by lenders in relation to personal loans is calculated as a percentage of the loan amount and is generally in the range of between 1.65% and 2.75% of the loan amount. It is usually paid after settlement of the loan.
No trail commission is payable by lenders in relation to personal loans.
Leases
Upfront commission payable by lessors in relation to leases is calculated as a percentage of the lease amount and is generally in the range of 0.5% and 4% of the lease amount. It is usually paid after settlement of the lease. Trail commission is generally not payable in relation to leases.
Further details of the commission earned by us will be included in the Statement of Credit Assistance disclosure document we will provide to you at the same time as we provide you with Credit Assistance.
You can request information from us about the fees or commission that we are likely to receive, how they are calculated, and our reasonable estimate of the fees or commissions that will be payable.
Volume Bonus Arrangements
From time to time Purple Circle Financial Services Pty Ltd, our Credit Representatives (or our broker group) may receive a benefit, directly by way of cash bonus or additional commissions or indirectly by way of training, professional development days or sponsorship, if we or our broker group write a particular volume of loans offered by those lenders.
Referral Fees
We may pay a referral fee (i.e. commission) for third party referrals. An example of a referrer would be a real estate agent, financial planner, accountant or solicitor. This fee is not payable by you.
Further information about referral fees, including our reasonable estimate of the amount of any fees payable and how it is calculated is available from us on request and will be included in the Statement of Credit Assistance document we will supply to you when we provide you with Credit Assistance.
Purple Circle Financial Services Pty Ltd and our Credit Representatives may also receive a benefit for referring you to other specialist service providers. We will disclose this to you at the time we make the referral.
Ownership
The broker group provides arm’s-length services to our business which include IT systems, loan information and lodgement systems, training and development, commission processing, conferences and professional development events, and assistance with regulatory and compliance obligations. In consideration of the services the broker group gives us, we pay fees to the broker group or the broker group retains some of the commission our panel lenders pay on loans we arrange.
Our business is owned and managed independently from the broker group.
Our Dispute Resolution procedures
We are committed to providing you with the best possible service. If, at any time, we have not met our obligations, or you have a complaint about any of our services, please inform us so we can work towards a resolution. We will endeavour to deal with your complaint promptly, thoroughly and fairly.
If you have a complaint, try to resolve this first with our Credit Representative. If you are unable to resolve your complaint within five (5) business days, you can contact our Complaints Manager using any of the following methods.
In writing: 14A Porter Street, Beaconsfield, WA 6162, Australia
Phone: 1300 366 406
Email: compliance@purplecfs.com.au
We may ask for additional information and request you to put your complaint in writing to ensure your issue is properly investigated. In cases where your complaint will take longer to resolve, we will update you progressively.
Our Complaints Manager will acknowledge receipt of your complaint within 24 hours. If unable to resolve the complaint/dispute to your satisfaction within five (5) business days, they will write to you advising the procedures we will follow in investigating and handling your complaint.
Within 30 calendar days from the date you lodged the complaint with us, we will write to you advising you the outcome of the investigation and the reason/s for our decision, or if required, we will inform you if more time is needed to complete the investigation.
Third Party Products or Services
If your complaint relates to a product or service acquired through a third party (for example, a lender) we may ask you to contact the relevant third party. It will deal with your complaint under its complaint’s resolution process.
If you are not satisfied with the resolution of your complaint by the third party under its complaint’s resolution process, you are entitled to have your dispute considered by its External Dispute Resolution Scheme. Please contact the third party for further details.
External Dispute Resolution Scheme
If you do not think we have resolved your complaint to your satisfaction, you may take the matter – free of charge – to our External Disputes Resolution Scheme (provided it is within the Scheme’s terms of reference) as detailed below, however if our internal process is still in progress, it may request that our internal processes be complete before considering the matter further.
Our external dispute resolution service provider is the Australian Financial Complaints Authority which can be contacted via:
Telephone: 1800 931 678 (free call)
Website: http://www.afca.org.au
Mail Address: GPO Box 3, Melbourne, VIC 3001
Fax: 03 9613 6399