ESG

Doing the right thing. It’s the Pepper Way.

Our commitment to ESG

At its heart, ESG is about sustainability and making meaningful changes, big and small. Our mission has always been to help people succeed while positively impacting the world around us.

In a time where the world is facing some of its significant challenges, it’s more crucial than ever for us to make a positive difference. We’re committed to developing an ambitious Environmental, Social, and Governance strategy as a business priority, placing the environment and society at the heart of everything we do.

From improving access to mortgages for our customers and supporting colleague development to reducing our carbon footprint and championing equality, we’re committed to ensuring every business decision is thoughtful, ethical, and accountable.

It’s a long journey, but we’re on our way – focusing on sustainability, accessibility, inclusivity, and responsibility.

This is the Pepper way forward.

ESG strategy

To ensure our ESG strategy and pillars focus on what matters most, we engage with our stakeholders to gather their views.

In early 2024, we completed a double materiality assessment to identify what matters most to Pepper both financially and in terms of our impact on people and the planet. Going forward, we’ll broaden our stakeholder engagement to refine our focus areas and develop ESG-focused KPIs with medium and long-term goals to guide our progress and uphold our commitments.

Sustainability

We’re committed to minimising our environmental impact – reducing our carbon footprint, traveling less, and supporting carbon offsetting schemes through Ecologi that address multiple UN Sustainable Development Goals (SDGs). We also support the natural world by planting and funding local beehives through Ecologi. In addition, we’re actively developing products that encourage greener choices in both new and existing homes.

Accessibility

We strive to make mortgages accessible to everyone, aligning with our mission, ‘To Help People Succeed’. We believe that complex circumstances, such as self-employment, multi-source income, or past financial difficulties, should not prevent anyone from being considered for a mortgage. Our goal is to ensure our customers receive fair value, understand our products, and are satisfied with our services, driving forward our ethos of support and financial empowerment.

Inclusivity

We’re dedicated to being an ally and creating an inclusive workplace that values diversity, promotes employee development, and encourages engagement. We have long championed equality and have established various colleague-led committees focusing on DE&I, neurodiversity, and mental health and wellbeing initiatives. In 2024, we launched our first staff network, the LGBTQ+ Network Group, and continue to strive to make Pepper a place where everyone feels they belong.

Responsibility

We uphold the highest standards of governance, integrating ethics and cyber and data security into every layer of our operations. By ensuring that our vision and values are reflected in all our business and strategic decisions, we can ensure we’re always doing the right thing.

Environmental

We’re on a mission to operate an environmentally positive business.

Social

We have social impact at the heart of our strategy and plans.

Governance

We act in the best interests of our stakeholders.