The Financial Services Authority (FSA) has banned two colleagues of London mortgage broker Gary Lester of Lifestyle Mortgages for failing to scrutinise information provided by customers on application forms.
Earlier this month, FTAdviser.com broke the news that Mr Lester had been fined £103,000 for knowingly submitting 42 mortgage applications to lenders with false and misleading income information.
Mr Lester was fined for committing mortgage fraud to obtain a mortgage for himself in November 2006 by “significantly inflating his income”.
Two former Lifestyle mortgage advisers, Julie Hutcheson and Martin Winer, have also been banned from working in financial services for not appropriately scrutinising and challenging the information on mortgage application forms.
Mr Lester was banned working within the regulated financial services industry for “failing to act as a fit and proper person and for lacking honesty and integrity”.
During an investigation by the FSA, 42 out of 48 applications reviewed were based on fraudulent information and of those, 14 were found to have no supporting tax records at all.
Margaret Cole, director of enforcement and financial crime at the FSA, said: “The financial penalty reflects how Lester failed to meet the high standards expected by the FSA and this prohibition will make the mortgage market a safer place.
“Lester and his colleagues deserve to be banned and Lester in particular has been dealt with severely to deter others from conducting themselves in a similarly unacceptable way.
“The FSA will continue to prevent individuals acting without honesty and integrity from working in authorised firms in order to secure an appropriate degree of protection for consumers.”
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