Banks put loan pressure on commercial clients with preferred broker constraints

The broking community has accused banks of abusing their position by placing increasing and aggressive pressure on small commercial clients to use their preferred insurance intermediaries.

Mike Dickinson, business development director at Russell Scalan Insurance Brokers, said banks were regarding it as an additional income stream.

He said while any conditional lending would be difficult to prove, he and fellow Unitas brokers across the country had†substantial anecdotal evidence that banks were "abusing their position†to engineer appointments and push their preferred brokers more aggressively than previously".

"Our own experience would suggest the advice given is sub-standard with