CHRIS Pilling is happy that Yorkshire Building Society Group is well on track to being a truly modern mutual business.

The ‘Yorkshire’ part of the group – which also includes the Barnsley, Chelsea and Norwich & Peterborough building society brands, along with the Egg online business and Accord Mortgages trading through financial intermediaries, has been celebrating the 150th anniversary of its foundation in Huddersfield.

While heritage remains important, corporate eyes are firmly fixed on the future – as demonstrated by a complete rebranding programme launched earlier this year and a massive IT upgrade.

Chris said: “Today, YBS is a group of businesses, not just the Yorkshire, and we felt the 150 year landmark was a good time to refresh and modernise our image.

“The new single design reinforces that we are one group and also ensures that N&P, Chelsea and Barnsley customers appreciate that behind their local branch is a significant organisation. We know from research that when customers know that they have more trust in the organisation.

“We are a £36 billion business and top 10 UK financial institution, which has come through the financial crisis strongly and is still growing.

“YBS is doing well and is a good growth story, which is good news for Bradford and Leeds, for Yorkshire and for the UK economy.”

The inclusion of Leeds refers to the expansion into Broadgate House, where around 800 staff are based in a ‘hot-desking’ environment over two sparklingly refurbished floors of the former John Lewis city centre department store.

YBS chiefs said at the time of the move last year that a shortage of suitable quickly available space in Bradford had forced them to look to Leeds to alleviate overcrowding at the Rooley Lane headquarters.

They pledged to upgrade the Bradford premises and around £11 million has been spent giving the1,000 or so staff there equivalent modern conditions to their Leeds counterparts.

The commercial progress being made by YBS was clear from the half-year results this summer.

Pre-tax interim profits of £117.1million were 71 per cent higher than a year earlier. In spite of low interest rates, the group opened 100,000 new savings accounts –29 per cent more than 2013.

YBS also reported £3.7 billion in gross lending in the first six months of 2014 – half as much again as the same period last year.

The group also accounts for nearly 19 per cent of net UK mortgage lending, including an above industry average 38 per cent of mortgages to first time buyers.

While acknowledging the current mortgage market is not ‘normal’, following the financial crash and the various controversies surrounding banks, which have pushed more people into the arms of building societies, Chris Pilling said the figures underlined the group’s success.

“We have strong balance sheet growth, very strong profitability; strong mortgage lending and continue to attract new savings.

“This shows that we are doing what the business should in looking after people’s money and using it to enable people to buy homes.” We’re doing a really good job,” he said.

The group was also boosted recently with an upgrade from ratings agency Fitch for reducing its risk profile and successfully consolidating the Barnsley, Chelsea, N&P and Egg acquisitions. The upgrade should make it cheaper for the business to raise funds on capital markets Skipton and Leeds building societies were also upgraded due to their improving performance.

Chris said: “The upgrade reflects the ability of the business to deal successfully with significant changes, to its structure as well as the Society’s commitment to lending safely and securely, while balancing this with its continued dedication to helping first-time buyers on to the property ladder.

“It also demonstrates Yorkshire Building Society’s robust financial strength, which is illustrated by its strong and resilient profit levels and, its solid approach to funding and levels of liquidity, which are over and above regulatory requirements.”

Key to the group’s operational consolidation is a major IT upgrade as part of its £25 million investment programme under a five year plan announced 18 months ago.

This also includes refurbishing its branch and agency network, with around 135 given a new look by the end the year.

Chris said the new corporate identity providing a single logo across all brands was a modest part of the overall overall costs and had gone down well with both staff and customers.

Refurbishment had also boosted business. For instance, In Harrogate, where the branch had moved to larger premises used as a pilot for the new look, mortgage appointments had doubled and savings accounts openings were up by 50 per cent “We have the strength and confidence to spend what by our standards is a lot of money at a time when banks are closing branches as the world becomes more digital and online. The new signage ‘bigs up’ the words ‘building society’ reminds people that there are alternatives to banks on the high street.

“We strongly believe in face-to-face interaction as well as digital. It must be seamless and integrated and we still have work to do on that.

“The Mortgage Market Review has made personal contact more important. Selling mortgages on an advised basis plays to our inherent strengths and we also have Legal &General advisors based in branches to help people with investments,” said Chris.

The IT programme will bring YBS systems together and integrate different areas of the business.

“We’ll be able to manage the relationship with any customer in any channel anywhere in the country. For instance, current account customers will want to be able to live in one place, work in another and transact with us while on holiday elsewhere but that’s not possible now.

“Only about six per cent of customers overlap brands, but it’s growing, especially as digital operations grow. We just have to modernise and make it all happen,” he added.

Chris says the focus is firmly fixed on implementing the five year plan to increase productivity and efficiency, develop more web and mobile capabilities and boost IT effectiveness, making it easier for staff and customers to do business and generate financial benefits for the business.

He said YBS is not eyeing up acquisition targets and is unlikely to producer any ‘rabbits from the hat’.

“The years 2008 to 2011 when we took over three building societies and Egg was a good period for the organisation. All our resources are now focused on the business transformation and investment programme, “There’s significantly more value in developing what we’ve got than scanning round for other takeover opportunities.

“Our job now is to consolidate and make the business even stronger,” said Chris.