1.Each Heath Report identifies how many UK consumers are able to access to professional financial advice.
This has increased by 1.2m to 6.1m consumers in 2022. 4.9m consumers had access in 2019.
This is despite a drop of 950 advisers over the same period.
Advisers have on average increased their productivity by 24%.
2.THR4 identifies 3 major types of advice businesses.
-Boutique: generally high service option, probably financial planning advice, with a smaller client adviser ratio. This has dropped 9% in 3 years from 47% to 38%.
-Segmented: Different levels of service within the same firm. Complex to manage. This has increased 8% in 3 years from 14% to 22%.
-Generalist: Business which solves client problems as they occur. Often transactional in nature. Static at 34%.
3.Falling adviser numbers
-1,600 advisers leave the sector each year via retirement or moving to other roles with only 650 replacements coming forward. This was also identified in THR3 in 2019.
-Unless an industry wide training scheme is created there will be an ever-diminishing number of consumers who will be able to access advice.
4.Advisers’ Most Common Issues
-We next looked at what are the key issues for adviser firms. The first 5 issues are fully regulation-related with many types of business indicating a rate of 75%.
- The normal business-related issues rarely feature higher than 20%.
5.Suggested changes for the new Financial Services and Markets Bill
-The Impartial Financial Advisers Association is suggesting a new objective “Encourage consumers to save, invest and protect themselves for their financial independence and personal responsibility”.
-The current governance of regulation is an anathema to democracy. It allows poor policy making and allows the powerful to hide their failures. Its so-called independence allows the bureaucracy to influence events without taking any responsibility for their actions.
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The Heath Report 4 will be essential to all advisers for business and retirement planning, recruitment, bench marking and industry knowledge.
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