The fees on second charge loans needs to drop if such products are going to shed their image as being  seen as loans of last resort, a leading master broker has claimed.

Alistair Ewing of The Lending Channel said high fees were putting off customers and that the market needs to work together to improve perception.

He said: “Whilst this may make me unpopular broker fees need to be driven down. Unfortunately fees have proved to be a barrier to entry in the past and this is something we need to rectify.

“The Mortgage Credit Directive will go some way to remedying this which is surely a good thing as it is inevitable that they must go down.”

Clive Wilson, director of business development at fellow packager Brightstar, agreed about the “inevitability” of a drop in fees and said more had to be done to improve perception.

He said: “Perception matters and the only way to improve that is through education. We currently have a BDM team in Scotland which is working on that as we speak.”

And Ewing agreed, adding: “There is a big job to be done (on perception) and it is something we need to address as an entire market.

The pair were speaking at FSE Glasgow which is taking place at the Hilton, William Street, Glasgow until 5pm today.