Increasing pension and savings for the future

Paul_Herring

Aegis wrote: »

Kez100 wrote:

I disagree and I don't think this attitude helps your profession one little bit. It makes you look like salesmen not professional advisers and I am sure that is not what you want or feel you are.

I don't think that Paul's an IFA. [...]

I'm not. Nor do I have any current dealings with any FAs, I or otherwise.

(I note that the accusation was modified between your quoting the post and my reading it.)

Aegis

Kez100 wrote: »

No worries, I am. In fact, in a glass half full sort of way I am delighted that I hadn't been investing more. It's now I have the funds to start to seriously think of a way forward. I have to say it makes me question what other options I might have other than an investment via the IFA route.

Oh, you have plenty of other options. You can go it alone, inside or outside a pension, you can use ISAs instead of pensions, you can look for investment bonds (though why you'd want to is another question entirely), you can invest within a trust as part of your estate planning, you can invest directly. In terms of investments you have shares, gilts, corporate bonds, unit trusts, OEICS, ETFs, VCTs, Investment Trusts, CFDs/Spreadbetting, Forex, etc. The biggest single problem is getting started. The list above is by no means complete, and it can be very daunting to get involved immediately.

How you decide to proceed depends essentially on two factors: how much you know and how much work you are prepared to put in to managing your investments. Generally if the answer is little and little, an adviser is right for you, preferably a servicing one. If it's lots and lots, you can manage your own portfolio of investments through stockbrokers, fund supermarkets and any other resources you find.

From my experience (what little that's worth at this stage in my life) most people don't actually want to spend as much time as I do reading up on investments, and as I still consider myself a novice I would say that most people can benefit from seeing an adviser, but only if they go in knowing what they need.

dunstonh

I disagree and I don't think this attitude helps the profession one little bit. It makes them look like salesmen not professional advisers and I am sure that is not what they feel they are.

When you took yours out originally that is effectively what most were. Salesman. Regulatory changes, increases in qualifications and standards all occured afterwards and has seen the advisers split into two camps. Sales and Advice. Advisers want the FSA to stop allowing sales people to call themselves advisers. Sales people want to keep using the adviser tag (although some firms have dropped the adviser tag from their titles). For a while it looked like the FSA was going to agree to that but they backed down saying it was against EU rules.

I conclude nothing of the sort. I conclude that you expected your advisor to perform yearly reviews, something that you neither asked him to do, nor paid him to do - it doesn't matter that your advisor didn't ask "did you want yearly reviews. It'll cost more."

That is what it boils down to. If you dont use a servicing adviser and dont say you want servicing then you are not likely to get it. The pension contracts back then (and many today) did not allow for the remuneration to pay for servicing. So, typically that means going on fee basis or going on a retainer.