Financial Advice NZ? Wait and see

One adviser association will wait a couple of years before deciding whether its members will join Financial Advice NZ.

Thursday, August 10th 2017, 6:00AM

The TripleA association has just under 200 members, with another 30 applications pending.

Its chief executive, Wayne Smith, said he had had no formal conversations with the working group developing the new association.

The working group has indicated that it would like to attract the members of existing associations, as well as those advisers who are not part of any body at present.

But Smith said it was too soon to commit to joining forces, anyway.

“TripleA is sitting on the fence and watching Financial Advice NZ developments. Good on the PAA and IFA for the initiative in getting this off the ground and we note the Minister's support for a larger, pan-industry body but we would want to see the new organisation working effectively for a couple of years at least before my board is likely to give any serious consideration to joining.”

Smith said, from his own point of view, he could see merit in the idea of having a single voice for advisers.

“When I took up the job one of the first questions I asked was ‘why are there so many industry associations in this industry’?”

The associations worked together as part of a stakeholder engagement group including IFA, PAA, SIFA and IBANZ.

“If there was a smaller number of industry associations, could have have more of an effect on behalf of advisers? Probably yes but that’s just my personal view,” Smith said.

TripleA used to be the Axa Advisers Association. When AMP bought Axa, it already had an adviser association.

Members were given the option of being aligned to AMP or being independent. Smith said 250 of the 254 members at the time elected for independence.

“A lot have legacy Axa books that have been taken over by AMP but a large number do a lot of work with a lot of other providers. As soon as those 250 said no we want to be independent we in effect at that point became a smaller version of the IFA and PAA, out there in NZ Inc focusing on a range of services we offer.”

Tags: AMP Financial Advice New Zealand financial advisers IFA PAA SiFA TripleA