Few takers for advice - but retirees rue missed opportunity
Many retirees regret not taking financial advice, but it’s not easy to get people who need it to take an interest, data shows.
Thursday, December 7th 2017, 6:00AM
by Susan Edmunds
A survey by the Financial Services Council shows nearly 40% of retirees said they regretted not getting more financial advice.
Among those aged 65 and older, 19% wanted advice on how to invest their KiwiSaver funds and 22% would like providers to offer more advice about how to draw down their savings.
But work conducted within the sector shows there is a lack of interest from those who still have time to benefit from it.
ANZ is involved in a behavioural insights project with the Financial Markets Authority and MBIE to help determine what communication with members best helps them make decisions about their retirement.
Randomly selected KiwiSaver members are receiving targeted communications encouraging them to either check they are on track for retirement by using ANZ’s online calculators, or seek financial advice.
Six months into the pilot, the results show most of the members contacted opt to do nothing. Of those that did something, most wanted a DIY approach with online calculators.
Only very few wanted personalised advice. Lockyer could not reveal the exact statistics.
“ANZ agrees with the FSC and the FMA that there is a need for financial advice to be more accessible. We are working hard to make our members aware of the range of options that are available – from class to personalised advice, online, face-to-face and on the phone,” Ana-Marie Lockyer, ANZ’s general manager of wealth products, said.
Most people offered financial advice said they could not spare the time.
“Some of them expressed an interest in talking to an AFA but were too busy to commit to a time. Being too busy is not going to help in 10 years,” she said.
But she said the advice conversation did not need to be long to be effective.
Lockyer said adviser clients made it clear they could see the value of advice. She would like to be able to share more “good news” stories of real people who had sought advice, to build market confidence in all advisers.
“How do we ensure people see the benefits of that and therefore seek it?”
FSC research also showed that most retirees were reduced to just living on the pension after 10 years in retirement. Chief executive Richard Klipin said that was not because they spent excessively but indicated a need for more education and advice so that they had a more diversified portfolio of assets.
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