The new self-employed part of the Prudential Financial Planning (PFP) business is to be called The Advice Partnership (Tap).
Prudential UK & Europe announced the name today (March 22) and confirmed that Tom Hegarty will be at the helm.
Mr Hegarty joins PFP from his role as managing director at the New Model Business Academy, a not-for-profit subsidiary of the SimplyBiz Group.
He also sits on the strategic advisory group of adviser trade body Pimfa and previously held senior sales management roles at Tenet group, Met Life and Friends Provident.
Initially Tap will be available on an invitation-only basis for up to 30 of PFP’s 375 existing advisers.
Those that join Tap will be able to build their own business and, following an initial five-year minimum period, will have the option to sell their businesses on.
This would suit advisers that are five years away from retirement and looking to make some money by selling their business to another adviser, the Pru stated.
According to Prudential, the business will mirror PFP's product offering and include the firm's wrappers, investment solutions and a near whole-of-market range on annuity and protection products.
It added that this offering may develop further in the future.
Chris Haines, chief executive at Prudential Financial Planning, said: "Demand for financial advice is higher than it’s ever been, and this initiative represents a great opportunity to extend advice to consumers.
"Our clients can continue to receive a consistent experience through the new model, and we can also meet the career aspirations and lifestyle needs of some of today’s employed partners.
"Through a self-employed proposition, we can deliver a scalable, cost-effective distribution channel, with the potential to provide step-change growth, whilst maintaining incremental growth of our core, employed field force."
Mr Hegarty said: "It is still abundantly clear that consumers are not getting access to the advice that they need. Regulation and spiralling costs continue to make things difficult for advisers and limiting the number of clients they can see. A clear consequence is fewer consumers getting advice.
"All routes need to be considered to address this. Through operational efficiencies, investing heavily in technology and centralising resources across a well-capitalised base companies like Prudential have an important role to play in opening up advice options and supplementing existing channels."
However, Martin Bamford, chartered financial planner at Informed Choice, was more critical.
He said: "This isn’t filling the advice gap but a strategy to boost distribution of Prudential products. It’s important we don’t conflate advice or planning with product sales.
"There’s a place for selling suitable financial products to the mass market, which product provider sales teams and technology solutions can contribute towards.
"Closing the advice gap requires the training and deployment of skilled financial planners, who are independent from their product provider masters."
Tap, is expected to launch fully later this year.
