The Finance Brokers Association of Australia is attempting to reduce the amount of disclosure paperwork associated with consumer lending and mortgages under the NCCP.
CEO Peter White said he and federal treasury officials are looking at ways to simplify the disclosure obligations so consumers can better understand what is happening with their mortgages.
“While I acknowledge the intention of the act is transparency around terms and conditions, the irony is that there is now so much paperwork, people are not even trying to understand it,” White said.
“There are 60 to 100 pages of disclosure paperwork for a mortgage, and when you add in all of the applications, contracts, guides and the mortgage document itself, it can come to hundreds of pages.”
White said the mountains of paperwork were unintended and must be simplified for people to be willing to read it.
“Instead of consumers reading a little bit of what they used to get, they are now potentially reading nothing because it’s too overwhelming.”
It would take four to five hours for a customer, broker and solicitor to read and discuss every page, he said.
White is confident the
FBAA will make progress in its discussions with treasury and regulators.
