{"id":29205,"date":"2015-03-31T16:41:04","date_gmt":"2015-03-31T05:41:04","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/?p=29205"},"modified":"2015-03-31T16:41:04","modified_gmt":"2015-03-31T05:41:04","slug":"trowbridge-recommendations-a-place-to-start-synchron","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/2015\/03\/31\/trowbridge-recommendations-a-place-to-start-synchron\/","title":{"rendered":"Trowbridge Recommendations a Place to Start – Synchron"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Trowbridge recommendations are a \u201cstarting point\u201d for the industry, according to Synchron\u2019s Don Trapnell<\/strong>.<\/p>\n

<\/p>\n

\"Synchron<\/a>
Synchron Director, Don Trapnell<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Responding to John Trowbridge<\/strong>\u2019s report on retail life insurance, released last week, Mr Trapnell said that while change was necessary, the industry must first assess the impact of the recommendations on consumers, advisers and advice businesses.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Report marks a starting point, however before we knee-jerk to implement such wholesale changes, we must ensure they actually do benefit consumers and are meaningful,\u201d Mr Trapnell said.<\/p>\n

According to Synchron, Mr Trowbridge missed a golden opportunity to conduct modelling that demonstrates to Government and regulators the real effect of the changes proposed.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe changes will require insurers to conduct extensive systems reviews and that comes at a cost. Therefore, we do not believe insurers will be able to reduce premiums. As suggested by the Report, advisers will be able to make up the commission lost by charging the client a fee – this of course means there will be an increase in the cost of insurance advice for consumers. It\u2019s difficult to see how this could possibly make consumers better off.\u201d<\/p>\n

…we do not believe insurers will be able to reduce premiums<\/h6>\n

Mr Trapnell said he was concerned the recommendations would force small business advisers out of business and a whole range of people from their businesses onto the job market.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe Report suggests that businesses will recoup losses in a few years\u2019 time. Small businesses simply cannot withstand losses for that period of time and would be forced to shed staff and cut costs simply to survive. If the recommendations are implemented, we estimate that job losses, both direct and indirect, suffered by Synchron practices alone would number around 500 people.\u201d<\/p>\n

Mr Trapnell and Synchron Independent Chair, Michael Harrison<\/strong>, are about to embark on a \u2018fact-finding mission\u2019 to the UK, to observe the effects of the country\u2019s Retail Distribution Review (RDR).<\/p>\n

\u201cWe decided some time ago to go on a fact-finding mission to the UK to observe the effects of the RDR on the advice profession, how UK legislation and\/or regulation has changed as a result and whether there are lessons Australia could learn from the experience,\u201d Mr Trapnell said. \u201cThe release of the Trowbridge Report has confirmed our belief that this kind of review of a market that is similar to our own, is not just necessary but absolutely vital.\u201d<\/p>\n

…we estimate that job losses… suffered by Synchron practices alone would number around 500 people<\/h6>\n

Synchron will visit a number of major stakeholders in the UK, including insurers, large and small independent advice businesses, and the Personal Finance Society, an adviser association similar to the Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) in Australia.<\/p>\n

\u201cThe question we will be trying to answer is this: if the UK has been through a similar experience to Australia, why has it resulted, or conversely not resulted, in the implementation of recommendations similar to those contained in the Trowbridge Report and how has that affected the profession as a whole,\u201d Mr Trapnell said.<\/p>\n

To find out more about the RDR, click here<\/a> to read our article in the latest edition of riskinfo Magazine, which looks at the possible impact of the removal of upfront commissions from life insurance advice.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Trowbridge recommendations are a \u201cstarting point\u201d for the industry, according to Synchron\u2019s Don Trapnell.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":7,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,6,270],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-29205","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","category-compliance-regulation","category-dealer-groups","category-remuneration"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29205","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/7"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=29205"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/29205\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=29205"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=29205"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=29205"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}