IFA ongoing fee..Why pay?

dunstonh

Comparing an IFA to a medical doctor is absurd. It’s a six year degree followed by many years as a junior doctor (JHO, HO, registrar, senior registrar). 

I didn't bring medical up. You did.   At the end of the day, one has level 4-6 and the other 4-8.   

I always thought employed IFAs are not that well paid. Like many things I assumed the real money is in running your own IFA business.

Generally, they are lower paid.  One I know has to generate £100k of fee income to earn £30k.  Another I know gets only 20% of the fee income.

Apparently an experienced one can earn £90,000 per year. Ridiculous in my view. 

Theoretically possible but by no means the norm for an employee adviser.   That level is more common for owner/director experienced adviser.

coyrls

dunstonh said:

I didn't bring medical up. You did.   At the end of the day, one has level 4-6 and the other 4-7.   

I've never seen this level comparison before.  What body is certifying the equivalence of these levels?

NottinghamKnight

Of course there are plenty of people with level 7 qualifications in sport science, marketing, psychology etc etc, many of which will be from former colleges of higher education outside the top 150 'universities' in the country. 

dunstonh

coyrls said:

dunstonh said:

I didn't bring medical up. You did.   At the end of the day, one has level 4-6 and the other 4-7.   

I've never seen this level comparison before.  What body is certifying the equivalence of these levels?

What qualification levels mean: England, Wales and Northern Ireland - GOV.UK (www.gov.uk)
Then the examination boards for the various professions fall within those.

fred246

https://www.simplyacademy.com/our-courses/dipfa/
7 months of part time study. Same as a surgeon.

BananaRepublic

dunstonh said:

Comparing an IFA to a medical doctor is absurd. It’s a six year degree followed by many years as a junior doctor (JHO, HO, registrar, senior registrar). 

I didn't bring medical up. You did.   At the end of the day, one has level 4-6 and the other 4-7.   

I always thought employed IFAs are not that well paid. Like many things I assumed the real money is in running your own IFA business.

Generally, they are lower paid.  One I know has to generate £100k of fee income to earn £30k.  Another I know gets only 20% of the fee income.

Apparently an experienced one can earn £90,000 per year. Ridiculous in my view. 

Theoretically possible but by no means the norm for an employee adviser.   That level is more common for owner/director experienced adviser.

I didn't bring medical up. You did.   At the end of the day, one has level 4-6 and the other 4-7.   
You’re doing it again. The idea that an IFA course compares to a medical degree is pathetic. Next you’ll tell me you have a really loud guitar amp that goes up to eleven. Medical schools select the brightest, hardest working students. And plenty fail to complete the course. You can get into a fifth rate university with mediocre exam grades to study a finance/economics degree. 

Mothman

BananaRepublic said:

Mothman said:

I don't have a downer on IFA's perse, and no doubt my wife will need to use one should I decide to depart this mortal coil before her. However I do feel that the IFA's which regularly post on this forum are a 'cut above' those that I have so far have come into contact with. For instance my Mum's IFA has done nothing with her investments despite collecting at least £25k in fees over the last 21yrs. I guess it's easier to just collect the trail commissions\ongoing servicing fees rather than actually doing something for it.
Like all professions there will be good,bad & just plain lazy IFA's like my Mum's, the hard part seems to be finding the good ones.

How well did your mum’s investments do? I’m sure you are right, some will be good, some not. 

Some performance has not been great. The IFA chose 3 onshore investment bonds (Pru, Aviva & Scot Widows) all With Profits Funds . The Pru bond performance has been acceptable but the Aviva & Scot Widows has been poor, for instance Mum just received a valuation for the Aviva bond and value is the same as it was in Feb 2019. Also the IFA has made no effort  to move the investments from tax paying investment bonds into ISA's, the usual tax advantages of investment bonds don't apply to Mum as she has never been a higher rate tax payer.

The rest of the money was put in a Canada Life Intl offshore investment bond (in trust), this was chosen at the time for IHT mitigation purposes which was fair enough. The bond is invested in four funds, currently split approx 80% equities (43% Europe, 25% UK, 6% USA, 6% R.O.W,) & 20% Bonds (majority corporate). From Jun 2012 - Jun 2020 perfomance has largely been in line with VLS80 but since Jun 2020 it has outperformed VLS80 mainly due to the volatile European fund. Trustnet portfolio risk score = 70 (VLS80=64), the risk profile of the portfolio has ramped up over the years as no rebalancing has ever been done

The_Green_Hornet

An IFA comparing themselves to a surgeon is the funniest thing I have read on this site so far this year.

If I was to compare them to any profession it would be a horse racing tipster.

fred246

The_Green_Hornet said:

An IFA comparing themselves to a surgeon is the funniest thing I have read on this site so far this year.

If I was to compare them to any profession it would be a horse racing tipster.

No they aren't the tipster. They are the tipster of tipsters.

BananaRepublic

The_Green_Hornet said:

An IFA comparing themselves to a surgeon is the funniest thing I have read on this site so far this year.

Exactly, only a clown would make such a comparison.