Your IndustryMar 30 2021

PFS extends financial education programme

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PFS extends financial education programme

The PFS has launched a section on its website called Your Money which includes has a health check tool to help people see where their cash is going and how they can better manage their money.

This tool is aimed at addressing the needs of adults for more information on how to balance a budget, secure a financial safety net, fund care and ensure an income when they retire, according to the PFS.

The Your Money section will include articles from financial advisers on what adults can do to improve their finances.

A savings calculator is also available to aid adults with long term goals such as buying a home.

Keith Richards, chief executive of the Personal Finance Society, said: “Following the ongoing success of our school-focused programme My Personal Finance Skills, which has around 1,000 volunteer education champions across the UK, it seemed logical to extend the promotion of financial education, support tools and the principle of financial well-being to everyone.

“The FCA’s recent consumer survey on Financial Lives identified that the stark challenges facing more than half of adults, a general lack of financial resilience and vulnerability to scams. Improving personal finance skills either a little or a lot can make life changing differences and additionally raises the profile of professional advice.

“The responsibility for making money last a lifetime increasingly falls on the shoulders of individuals. Individuals take on the burden of risk in a way that they did not have to in the past when it was shared more with government and employers.”

In May last year, more than 900 members of the Personal Finance Society joined its pro-bono programme to provide financial education in schools across the country.  

This came as the professional body has launched a website to continue educating students despite national school closures as a result of the coronavirus lockdown. 

The My Personal Finance Skills programme sees advisers deliver financial workshops to students aged between 14 and 18 years old.

Schools will be encouraged by the PFS to share the My Personal Finance Skills link with parents of pupils who receive financial education workshops from its pro-bono initiative.

In 2018, research by Quilter showed more than three quarters of UK adults who did not receive financial education at school wish they had.

The company found 77 per cent of UK adults did not or could not recall receiving financial education at school. 

Of this group, 79 per cent of wished they had received some form of financial education.

Quilter surveyed 2,000 adults in October 2018 to mark the start of Talk Money Week, aimed at getting more people talking about their finances to improve money management across the UK.

Earlier this month, The Personal Finance Society announced it had teamed up with Next Gen Planners to provide boot camps for university students interested in joining the financial planning profession.

The boot camps will start by explaining the types of careers available in financial planning with employers giving an overview of the profession.