The seemingly eternal debate of ‘fees versus commission' continues to rage, having been recently fuelled by the ABI's latest response to the FSA's retail distribution review.
As a strong advocate of Lifestyle financial planning myself, I believe that the concept of a client servicing culture, and the effective project management of clients from cradle to grave is not exclusive to the fees environment. Surely it can equally co-exist with a commission culture. A few years ago I spent some time with Australian advisers in Sydney, who purport to be exclusively fee charging, but on scratching the surface, you soon discover that they are actually adopting a commission-offset model. Their financial planning proposition is based on an upfront plan fee (which can be ...
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