Ryanair customers in Ireland and Britain will be able to apply for a mortgage while booking their flight on the airline's website from today.

Visitors to ryanair.com now have access to the mortgage products of Bank of Scotland via a link to the website of Dublin-based broker Richardson Insurance.

Ryanair and 123.ie have promised to pay the property-valuation charges of any customer who chooses to organise a mortgage through the new facility.

This is the first time that Bank of Scotland has offered online mortgage applications outside its own website, a move which a spokesman yesterday described as "novel".

Since last October, Richardson has been offering motor and home insurance products through the Ryanair site, by linking its own website - 123.ie - to the airline's home page.

The extension of this service to include Bank of Scotland mortgages reflected a general expansion in Richardson's product offerings, said a spokesman.

In the Republic, clients who click through to the mortgage site will deal exclusively with 123.ie, which will handle applications as an authorised broker.

In the UK, meanwhile, customers seeking further information on a mortgage will be asked to call a freephone number which will then bring them through to a Bank of Scotland call centre.