Annuity purchase advice please

dunstonh

BarGin wrote: »

Do Annuity Direct count as IFAs?

Not sure. Look at their website and you see just 7 providers listed. One of the biggest and frequently best is missing. Yet, they say they give totally independent advice. To be independent, you have to be whole of market.

The other issue is more to do with the service you buy. They offer advised and non-advised. Online quotes have no haggling built into them. Haggling is what an IFA does on advised cases manually. For example, I got the quotes on case last week but today have haggled with a couple of providers to get them increased. It is that stage that gets missed out on the online quote providers.

Looking at their charges list, they look expensive and charge more for enhanced annuities than non-enhanced (most charge the same).

SallyG

Will you get the best annuity haggling from the biggest IFA firms - ie can we assume the best deals go to the best repeat business opportunities?
Which IFA firms do the most annuity business?

dunstonh

Will you get the best annuity haggling from the biggest IFA firms - ie can we assume the best deals go to the best repeat business opportunities?

Not really. Many IFA firms are either networked or directly authorised but buy compliance services and the combined buying power of these leads to economies of scale. Not the individual firm size.

Which IFA firms do the most annuity business?

That would be the Sesame Bankhall group either on network IFAs or the directly authorised IFAs who use them. They account for something like 9000 advisers across the group. Although economy of scale pricing isnt really a factor on annuities. it is anticipated to be a factor with superclean fund pricing in the future and is more common on insurance contracts and platform pricing.