The chartered financial planner for Norwich-based Almary Green said other methods must be used to raise awareness since the ban on commission had made it even more difficult for younger people to pay for face-to-face financial advice.
Most of their saving needs, he added, were simple and could be achieved through direct-to-consumer offerings, although products like life insurance still required more rigorous guidance.
He said: “There is an awareness problem, as the average 25-year-old is not thinking about life insurance. The younger generation can be engaged, but we have to make it easier for them by making it clear online.
“Areas like life insurance and critical illness is potentially where face-to-face advice can come through and the costs of the financial advice can be spread out through commission.”
For other financial needs, such as savings and investments, Mr Durrant claimed that online direct-to-consumer initiatives were likely to be the future for how younger people pick up financial advice.
As younger people now accessed information online and were often unable to afford face-to-face financial advice post-RDR, he urged his peers to find alternative, less profitable ways to service them.
He said: “You could offer a direct-to-consumer offering that lets them set up investments and savings. It needs to be something suitable for them that they can monitor themselves.
“There is no money or very little to be made in this, but in the long-term profits could potentially be made. You would be looking at this as a way to get in contact later on.”
Andy McCabe, managing director of East Sussex-based Selectapension, said: “I think advisers will have better inroads to speak with the younger generation now that many will have pension pots through auto-enrolment.”
