{"id":67499,"date":"2023-09-05T20:43:21","date_gmt":"2023-09-05T10:43:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/?p=67499"},"modified":"2023-09-19T10:33:32","modified_gmt":"2023-09-19T00:33:32","slug":"support-for-insurers-to-deliver-limited-personal-advice","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/2023\/09\/05\/support-for-insurers-to-deliver-limited-personal-advice\/","title":{"rendered":"Support for Insurers to Deliver Limited Personal Advice"},"content":{"rendered":"

A cross section of industry stakeholders is generally supportive of the recommendation that life insurers should have the ability to provide limited personal financial advice to their policy holders.<\/p>\n

This was the consensus at the recent MetLife Industry Round Table<\/a>, where panellists reflected on the decision of the Financial Services Minister to initially allow a Quality of Advice Review recommendation around broadening access to financial advice to apply to superannuation funds but not to other entities.<\/p>\n

While there was broad support for the decision to allow super funds to provide limited advice to their members, panellists also pointed out the issue of underinsurance in Australia is equally urgent in its need to be addressed as the pressing need to provide a solution for the existing retirement income advice gap.<\/p>\n

Some personal advice does not need the skills, expertise and judgment of a financial adviser…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

The rationale underpinning QoA Review Leader Michelle Levy’s<\/strong> recommendation to allow institutions the ability to provide limited financial advice includes her argument that in order to make personal advice more accessible and affordable, the range of people who are able to give that advice needs to expand. In the Chapter 5 summary of the Quality of Advice Review Final Report<\/a>, Levy adds \u201cSome personal advice does not need the skills, expertise and judgment of a financial adviser and should be able to be provided by other people (and entities).\u201d<\/p>\n

Levy also argues that if the regulatory framework continues to require all personal advice to be given by a financial adviser, “\u2026it would exacerbate the existing accessibility and affordability issues which are part of the reasons for this Review.” She added \u201c\u2026I do not think it is necessary or in the interests of consumers to require all personal advice to be given by a financial adviser.\u201d<\/p>\n

Responding to a question as to how advisers would respond to the prospect of product manufacturers providing limited advice to policy holders, Council of Australian Life Insurers<\/a> CEO, Christine Cupitt<\/strong>, suggested there would be mutual benefits were this to take place.<\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a>
CALI CEO, Christine Cupitt …working towards the same outcome<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

She said the proposition ticks the box around a shared interest in making sure that consumers have the right level of life insurance protection and it also means that customers who receive some level of advice from a life insurer will develop a greater familiarity and confidence with the advice process ahead of potentially taking the next step to obtain a holistic financial plan if that’s what suits their circumstances.<\/p>\n

We’re all trying to solve the same problem here…<\/p><\/blockquote>\n

“We’re all trying to solve the same problem here and work towards the same outcome, which is better financial outcomes and better risk protection for Australians,” said Cupitt.<\/p>\n

The adviser and licensee voices around the table were supportive of this proposition, where the only caution was around ensuring the client’s best interests are protected and that the quality of the advice being delivered did not compromise the hard-won gains in the re-emerging trust in advisers and the professionalism of financial advice being delivered to Australians.<\/p>\n

Riskinfo will report further developments in this area as the industry, particularly via representations made by CALI, continues to state its case to Canberra to extend to life companies the same capacity to deliver limited financial advice as the Government has decided to approve for superannuation funds.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

A cross section of industry stakeholders is generally supportive of the recommendation that life insurers should have the ability to provide limited personal financial advice to their policy holders. This was the consensus at the recent MetLife Industry Round Table, where panellists reflected on the decision of the Financial Services Minister to initially allow a […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":67507,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8,3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-67499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-compliance-regulation","category-general"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67499","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\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=67499"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/67499\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/67507"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=67499"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=67499"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/riskinfo.com.au\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=67499"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}