The Skipton Building Society has announces its annual results for 2014.

Its mortgage book grew by £1.3bn to £12.7bn, an annual growth rate of 11.2% (2013: 9.2%). Meanwhile, gross residential mortgage lending was up 23% to £3.0bn.

The UK’s fourth largest building society saw a 75% increase in total group profit before tax (PBT) to £181.6m.

It reported a 31,276 increase in members to 794,739, while savings balances grew by £1.2bn to £11.4bn.

David Cutter, Skipton’s group chief executive, said: “Our vision is ‘Building a Better Society’, and so much was achieved during 2014 towards making this a reality. It remains a difficult environment for savers, with Bank Base Rate held at 0.5% for six years, but it is pleasing to report growth of more than 11% in both savings and mortgage balances, well in excess of market growth, demonstrating a balanced performance and our competitive pricing. I am delighted that Skipton was ranked the third highest financial services provider in the UK for the level of customer experience excellence.

“A strong growth in membership, excellent underlying profits and a robust capital position give us the foundation to enhance our customer proposition as we seek to fulfill our vision of ‘Building a Better Society’.”