Your IndustryMay 4 2016

Advisers blame compliance for pension charges

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Advisers blame compliance for pension charges

Advisers have defended their charges after the regulator found a massive variation in client fees, blaming the cost of complying with FCA rules for hitting those with the least hardest.

Research by the Financial Conduct Authority found for advice on a UK average pension pot of £47,100, advisers charge anything from 1 per cent to 4.5 per cent.

This means an initial charge ranging from £471 to £2,119, a difference of 349 per cent.

Clients with the smallest amount of savings of £10,000 and below, faced paying higher proportions of up to 5 per cent.

But advisers have defended the wide range of charges, blaming compliance rules aimed at ensuring clients receive suitable advice for the the higher percentages levelled at those with less savings.

Jane Hodges, chief operating officer for national IFA Alexander House Financial Services, said the amounts paid out would often be similar to those with more assets.

“To access pension freedoms for clients as an adviser you have to look at their whole position.

“The consequences are fees are high because it doesn’t matter if you are advising on £10,000 or £50,000.

“The compliance regime is onerous because we cannot look at something in isolation and that comes with a cost implication.”

Anna Sofat, managing director of London-based Addidi, said: “We cannot take shortcuts.

“If you want gilt-edged service there is a cost, but at the same time the regulator is saying everyone should have that service and by the way, you have got to make it affordable – something has got to give.”

How to make advice cheaper by tackling the regulatory burden advisers face when giving full, independent, regulated advice was the focus of the FCA’s Financial Advice Market Review.

The subsequent report acknowledged some consumers would benefit from simpler, less tightly regulated and so cheaper, guidance or limited advice on a particular need.

HM Treasury, which jointly ran the review, will consult on a new advice definition. The FCA will consult on new guidance for firms so they can help consumers without a personal recommendation.

Ms Hodges welcomed the changes, but said she “had hoped FAMR would have come out with something that could help straight away”.

Greg Heath, managing director of Lancashire-based Derbyshire Booth, said a simple suitability process for clients who only wanted advice on one issue was “utopia”.

“The moment you start making a recommendation you run into the whole compliance process, which takes time and money.”

The FCA survey also found looked at charges for ongoing advice, and found larger firms tend to charge more than smaller advisers.

Clients with investable assets of £50,000 would pay on average 0.81 per cent at a large firm compared to 0.5 per cent at a small firm and 0.79 per cent at a medium firm.

The difference is similar for those with £10,000 who pay 0.8 per cent at a large firm and 0.5 per cent at a small firm.

This difference disappears gradually as asset size increases until it reaches £1m, when small and large firms both charge 0.5 per cent.

Patrick Connolly, head of communications at Chase de Vere, said his company doesn’t advice clients with less than £50,000.

But he suggested smaller firms may be able to charge less because they “are more geared up to work with lower value clients, perhaps by providing some or all of their advice by phone or email where their costs will be lower”.

Brewin Dolphin, St James’s Place and Succession have all been asked to comment while Brooks Macdonald has declined to do so.