Family Building Society has promoted Blaine Faragher and Phillip Townsend to joint directors of underwriting.

They replace Andrew Deeley, who has retired after ten years in the role.

Faragher began his career in financial services as a trainee inspector at a life assurance society in the 1980s, before carving out a career in mortgages.

Initially with the Bank of Ireland, he has since had roles as adviser and business development manager (BDM) with well-known lenders and also a spell as a Financial Ombudsman Service adjudicator.

He joined Family Building Society in 2017 as an underwriting manager.

Meanwhile, Townsend joined the society in 2013 as an underwriter.

Previously he had worked at Lloyds Bank, at Halifax as an in-house mortgage adviser before joining the Bank of Ireland’s underwriting team, where was also a PPI complaints investigator.

The pair head up a team of 24 loan underwriters who review all mortgage applications manually on a case-by-case basis.

The company says around 95 per cent of all applications come from brokers and other intermediaries, who are guided by the society’s growing team of BDMs.

Family Building Society chief executive Mark Bogard says: “The team of human underwriters we employ at the Family are here to ensure that underserved borrowers are lent to.

“Many of these would-be borrowers are finding it increasingly difficult to re-mortgage, let alone take out a new mortgage in these uncertain times.

“Phil and Blaine’s team are here to personally support brokers whose clients are being turned down by the major lenders, just because of their age or their stories are just too complicated for their computers.”