Firing lineJul 10 2020

What happened when IFA firm reached out to community amid lockdown?

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What happened when IFA firm reached out to community amid lockdown?

As the coronavirus pandemic was unfolding, like many adviser companies, FH Manning Financial Services felt compelled to “give a little bit back”, according to Claire Markham, its investment director. 

On April 2, she tweeted that it was offering phone appointments free of charge for those in the Lincolnshire area who did not have a financial adviser and wanted to discuss investment or pension holdings. On its website, Horncastle-based FH Manning stated that only “factual information” and “reassurance” would be provided.

“Surprisingly, right at the very beginning, when we started sharing on social media that we were offering that time to people, we had very few enquiries,” she says.

Ms Markham puts the initial delay in people using the service down to the shock of being in lockdown and the huge personal issues individuals were having to deal with. She thinks, at that time, financial matters took a back seat.

“Everyone was dealing with the change of working from home, having the children at home, and home schooling. I don’t think there was any capacity to be thinking about what their pension was worth right at the beginning.”

She adds: “I certainly didn’t worry about my pension for the first two weeks.”

Ms Markham notes: “There was so much change in physical circumstances and emotional circumstances — all those things took precedence. 

“I think for a lot of people that is still more important than the financial aspect.”

We’ve had younger people enquiring because they have lots of different pots that they’re worried about with a long-term view.

Even among their existing clients, with whom they engaged early on in lockdown, the discussions were less about their finances and more about how they were dealing with the lockdown.

An open door

But despite a slow start, the number of enquiries has picked up.

“Certainly, after a month, the conversations with our existing clients did start to change a little bit and we have had enquiries through this free service that we’re offering,” Ms Markham explains.

She highlights that FH Manning is not the only advice company offering this kind of service during the crisis.

“At the end of the day, our door is always open, and I think a lot of advisers are like that as well.”

Among the individuals without an adviser that Ms Markham and her colleagues have been speaking to through the free service, pensions have been the biggest concern.

“We’ve had younger people enquiring because they have lots of different pots that they’re worried about with a long-term view,” she notes. 

“We’ve also had people ring up at the other end asking, ‘is this going to affect when I can stop work?’”

Business as usual?

While FH Manning’s door may be “always open”, the company took a more proactive approach with its existing clients, making sure they were all contacted in the first four to six weeks of lockdown. Ms Markham says the average lengths of those phone calls was in excess of half an hour as they mainly discussed personal experiences.

We’ll want to get back to face-to-face eventually, but only when it’s right and only when people feel comfortable to do so.

These initial conversations were also about ensuring clients “knew that we were still here”, she notes, and that it was “business as usual — or as close as we could get to it”.

The company had seen the lockdown coming and began reducing the number of staff in the office prior to the UK government’s official announcement in March, which meant that systems and technology had been tested remotely.

“By coincidence, we had moved our client database and all our software to a cloud-based system last May. That means we can all access it in a secure way, and the data remains secure — that’s really important at the moment,” she adds.

One of the lessons the company has learned from the pandemic is that clients are “more open to different ways to communicate”, whether that is via access to an online portal, secure email or phone meetings.

“We have used some of the virtual video software, but not everybody is comfortable with that.”

Ms Markham admits she spends much of her day on the phone and does not see that changing in the near future.

“We’ll want to get back to face-to-face eventually, but only when it’s right and only when people feel comfortable to do so.”

Value of advice

One of the observations Ms Markham makes is that FH Manning’s existing clients were less worried about their finances than the individuals who came to them via the free phone service.

“A lot of our clients have been with us for a very long time and while they have not been through this before, they have been through other falls in the stock market and economic issues. They were more focused on what’s going on out there rather than their finances and trusted that we were keeping an eye on it,” she points out.

The pandemic and ensuing crisis has demonstrated where advisers can really add value, she believes.

“Our clients have had a very different experience, from a financial point of view, of this crisis, knowing they have someone to turn to, rather than people who haven’t [had an adviser to talk to].”

Ms Markham notes that plenty of data and research has shown there is a lack of trust in financial advisers and a perception that the industry tries to sell products.

“But, ultimately, I think if you’ve had a financial adviser, particularly at a time like this, you realise that’s not what the industry is like at all, and we are there to really support people and offer them a service.”

Ellie Duncan is a freelance journalist