Technology

Paraplanning outsourcing service The Timebank has unveiled a new website and administration features which are designed to speed up client report production and increase income for financial advisers through an online data exchange.

Lighthouse Group has unveiled its new IT platform to members under the brand LighthouseXpress, along with new distribution agreements with Abbey, Friends Provident, Norwich Union, Skandia and Standard Life.

An important online tool has gone live in the shape of the Land Registry's database of 19 million English and Welsh properties.

Quotes provider Webline has launched an annuities comparison service offering numbers from Norwich Union, Prudential, Friends Provident and Standard Life.

Distribution Technology's Dynamic Planner tool has been adopted by American Express for rollout to all users of its wrap platform.

Financial services moved closer towards ecommerce today with news 1st Software is launching the first phase of its "portal" - 1st Services - that seeks to act as a type of hub enabling greater ease of use and cheaper electronic trading.

American Express is not relaxing its vetting principles for doing deals with IFAs over use of its wrap account, but is widening the list of potential contacts as it moves to add services to the platform.

Depolarisation has led Standard Life to drop the ‘ifa' moniker from its ifazone.com service, which instead is being relaunched as adviserzone.com.

The Exchange has launched its upgraded service Exweb Gold, which includes all existing Exweb services as well as additional services such as in-force contract management and aggregated real-time policy valuations for pensions and bonds.

UK retail stockbrokers are being offered a new service from Dresdner Kleinwort Wasserstein which enables them to trade directly on all of Europe's major stockmarkets, including the NYSE and Nasdaq, using a single connection.