Paradigm Mortgage Services and Paradigm Protect have announced the winners of their annual Lender and Provider Awards, which is now in its fourth year.

The awards were voted for by Paradigm’s directly authorised member firms each month and the results collated over the course of 2017 to decide the winners.

The overall winners for 2017 are as follows:

• Best Overall Lender – Winner: NatWest.
• Best Residential Lender – Winner: Halifax.
• Best Buy-to-let Lender – Winner: Godiva.
• Best Specialist Lender – Winner: Precise Mortgages.
• Best Equity Release Lender – Winner: Hodge Lifetime.
• Best Life Protection Provider – Winner: Royal London.
• Best General Insurance Provider – Winner: Uinsure.
• Best Critical Illness Provider – Winner: AVIVA.
• Best Income Protection Provider – Winner: The Exeter.
• Best Group Risk Provider – UNUM.

Paradigm personnel also voted for their Strategic Partners of the Year awards, a special category for businesses which are judged to have excelled in their support of the Paradigm. These Strategic Partner awards are split between both the mortgage and protection side of the business. The winners are:

• Strategic Lender Partner of the Year – Kent Reliance.
• Strategic Provider Partner of the Year – AIG Life.

Each month, Paradigm’s members are encouraged to vote for their top three lenders and providers in each category, enabling Paradigm to provide an ongoing snapshot of advisers’ views throughout the course of the year. This annual process ensures those lenders and providers who consistently deliver service excellence are appropriately recognised, Paradigm said.

Bob Hunt, chief executive of Paradigm Mortgage Services/Paradigm Protect, said: “Firstly, a huge congratulations from all at Paradigm to our winners and runners-up in this year’s Awards. Over the course of the year we ask our member firms to vote for their top three every month, and from this we’re able to collate our overall winners, which have been announced today. We believe these Awards are considerably more rewarding and valuable than many others as they are a true reflection of our members’ preferences throughout the year, and not just at a single snapshot of time.

“2017 was an incredibly positive year for both Paradigm Mortgage Services and Paradigm Protect and a significant part of that is the strong relationships we have with lenders and providers, and their commitment and dedication to ensuring the very highest quality of service is provided to our member firms.

“Clearly, those businesses who have won awards today provided a consistent level of performance throughout the twelve months which has been recognised and rewarded by our membership. In that sense all our award winners can be justifiably proud of their efforts and the challenge begins now to match those efforts during the course of 2018 and beyond.”