As the principal of a firm of chartered financial advisers based in East Sussex, having struggled in the last eight years making sense of the economic and regulatory changes as well as all of the differing views and opinions on how and who should deliver advice, to find that only 68 financial advisers out of a total of 30,600 financial advisers responded to the Financial Advice Market Review (FAMR) (FA, 18 February) is astounding.
Apparently, it represents 1.2 per cent of all firms – that is still not enough.
I cannot believe that IFAs have not stood up to try to make a difference, and try and influence the changes that are needed from a practical and operational point of view.
Trade bodies – professional bodies – do not have all the operational facts to hand. They provide a very important purpose within our industry, but it should be down to us as individuals to communicate the problems and how we think they should be resolved as we are going round in circles.
So for those who could not find the time to put pen to paper, may I suggest that they look at the questions posed by the regulator and go about answering them in a way that will help them and the industry operate efficiently and effectively in providing good consumer outcomes. This would encourage people to actually want to work in financial services and persuade them to trust the regulator.
The news story that only 68 advisers responded to the FAMR is a story of apathy; I would much prefer to be reading about good news, about good practice, good firms, happy clients, proud professional bodies operating honestly and with integrity, and putting our collective needs first: that is the regulator, the adviser and the client.
Karl Hopper-Young
Operations and compliance director
Hailsham
East Sussex
