POWERED BY MOMENTUM MEDIA
Fees should be charged for super fund advice: UniSuper
Charging fees for superannuation advice would provide better outcomes for consumers, according to UniSuper, by making them more likely to implement the advice.
In its submission to the Quality of Advice Review regarding super funds being able to give advice, the fund said it already opted to charge its members for any intra-fund advice they received.
This was because it felt charging a fee helped to put a value on the service and make the advice more likely to be implemented.
Going forward following the Review, UniSuper said low fees for advice could led to a service being overused by a small cohort of members whereas charging fees would ensure people were likely to act on it.
“It is unfortunate, therefore, that the proposed regulatory relaxation around the best interests duty would be conditional upon not charging for the advice. While we agree that clients who pay a significant amount for financial advice are more likely to assume that the provider is acting in their best interests, we also believe that clients understand that the payment of a fairly token amount for assistance falls in a different category from paying for fully-charged comprehensive advice.”
It felt charging a nominal amount for ‘good advice’ would foster access to affordable advice by regulating demand and priortising those who were willing to pay the fee.
“If the regulations are only relaxed for free advice, there may be an increase in free advice given, but we may find that (in percentage terms) there is no increase in the amount of advice which is acted upon and an increase in wait times (or a loss of access) for other potential clients who are highly committed to obtaining and acting upon the advice,” it said.
AUTHOR
Laura Dew
Laura Dew is editor at Super Review. Prior to joining SR, she spent five years working at Investment Week in the UK covering asset and wealth management.
Recommended for you
Super funds have built on early financial year momentum, as growth funds deliver strong results driven by equities and resilient bonds.
The super fund has announced that Mark Rider will step down from his position of chief investment officer (CIO) after deciding to “semi-retire” from full-time work.
Rest has joined forces with alternative asset manager Blue Owl Capital, co-investing in a real estate trust, with the aim of capitalising on systemic changes in debt financing.
The Future Fund’s CIO Ben Samild has announced his resignation, with his deputy to assume the role of interim CIO.
TOP PERFORMING FUNDS
ACS FIXED INT - AUSTRALIA/GLOBAL BOND
Fund name
3y(%)pa
1
DomaCom DFS Mortgage
76.97 3 y p.a(%)
2
Global X 21Shares Bitcoin ETF
76.46 3 y p.a(%)
3
UBS Solactive Global Pure Gold Miners UCITS ETF Dis USD
51.13 3 y p.a(%)
4
Global X GlobalX FANG+ ETF
45.15 3 y p.a(%)
5
Select Baker steel Gold Institutional
43.78 3 y p.a(%)
