A financial education website that aims to help close the widening advice gap has launched today (25 February).
Fincate has been set up by Rob Lewis, managing director and founder of a multiple financial planning businesses based in Mold, St Asaph, and London.
Fincate – a portmanteau of financial and education – is described on its LinkedIn page as an online learning platform designed to provide accessible, expert-led guidance on all aspects of financial planning.
It was designed for individuals and businesses to make financial education "simple, affordable, and up-to-date with the latest laws and regulations".
Users have to sign up to an "affordable monthly subscription service", the venture said.
Lewis, founder and director at Celtic Financial Planning, commented: "I have been delivering financial education in the workplace for more than a decade and have seen the positive impact it can have, notably on auto-enrolment to pension schemes and reducing stress and absentee rates of employees who have money worries or are concerned about their savings and how they'll cope in the future."
He added: "A big problem in the UK is the advice gap, more advisers are retiring and leaving the industry than joining it, by some margin, so this is a way of helping to alleviate that pressure."
The experienced financial services professional, who has more than 20 years' experience, said demand was far outstripping supply and at present the amount of people in the UK with a financial adviser was lower than 10%.
"Fincate is an affordable, sustainable and independent way for them to be educated on a range of financial matters, in their own time and from the comfort of their home or workspace.
"The service shares information on a wide range of topics from how the banking system works to pensions and mortgages, overdrafts, credit cards, how you can align your pension to goals and objectives, and more.
"It is not advice; it is education and empowerment in a world where it is harder and harder for people to access financial guidance," said Lewis.
The website features more than 400 virtual lessons which will be regularly updated to ensure the most recent legislative and regulation changes are accounted for, added Lewis.
