Canada Life International said the concerns had been raised by “supporting and non-supporting” advisers as part of a regular opinion-gathering exercise it conducts.
The firm said advisers are “increasingly worried about the long-term implications of complex investment solutions as they fear it will restrict future options”.
CLI investments & business development executive director, Mario Ricciardi said: “Ahead of RDR the feedback we are getting is that advisers want to be free to pick and choose the investment programmes and wrappers/platforms which match their business model(s) and to retain greater control of the services they provide to their clients.
“They do not want to tie their clients or themselves to one or two investment platforms and hand even greater control to those platform providers.”
CLI added that advisers are also concerned about that too many “bells and whistles” on products can create confusion and actually take up “valuable fee earning time” and wonder whether or not, and indeed if so how, these costs should be passed on to clients.
“Our strategy is to maintain a simple and open approach to offering investment solutions,” added Ricciardi. “The key for CLI is to take the time to fully understand an adviser’s business model and requirements and then to work with them to build a set of solutions that work best for advisers and their clients. There is never a scenario where one investment platform will fit every client and adviser.”
