Adviser view: A message from gobsmacked in Sydney

Today’s edition of Adviser View comes from Richard Milroy, a director of Sydney-based Dealers’ Group, an information and services business for financial advisers.

If you have heard of the company, it is because they organise conferences in the UK, including a series later in the year on practice development.

Richard, a keen reader of the Citywire Blogs, heard alarm bells ringing when he read our recent story ‘Retirement income key to future planning, says Fidelity’ and took the time to explain why:

‘I was frankly gobsmacked to read this article. I work in the Australian financial planning market, so perhaps the perspective is skewed.

‘Is ‘Retirement income key to future planning‘ really news? Isn’t that what UK IFAs do anyway? Or are they so focused on up-front (and never repeated) sales commissions that this is a ground-breaking insight from some clever clogs at Fidelity?

‘I have been running an education and information business for Australian financial advisers for some years now. Sue, they are no angels and many of them are still hooked on commissions of various types.

‘But they have long ago realised the retirement income streams for their clients are where the mainstream market is at, and are a pot of gold for advisers.

‘Perhaps they needed different remuneration structures to make this work, but surely it’s obvious that repeat business from long-terms clients is better than lots of opportunistic one-off sales … or am I missing something?

‘We have been running conferences in Australia on topics such ‘Planning for pre- and post-Retirees’ and ‘Practice Development’ for some time, and I’m surprised that the issue of retirement income planning doesn’t come up for UK IFAs when talking to their clients.

‘Or perhaps it does - because God knows the clients need it!