The coronavirus pandemic has flipped the world on its head and impacted every aspect of daily life.
All firms have had to adapt to the circumstances brought about by covid-19, but some in the advice sector believe the changes may end up becoming the norm.
Model shift
Neil Moles, chief executive of Progeny, said to International Adviser: “I think the world’s going to change forever when we come out of this. It has to, and it’s an opportunity to do so.
“I think what this does is fast forward a lot of changes. I do think it will change the financial advice market forever.
“If clients want to do meetings over WebEx, Zoom or whatever medium, the financial planning business has to make that happen.
“The question is: are we going from face-to-face to screen-to-screen?
“We’ll judge that in two or three years’ time and see how many physical meetings happen versus virtual meetings now.
“Businesses have a responsibility to do this. If firms are honest about it, firms that haven’t got the IT sector, haven’t got the infrastructure, aren’t of the size that can support this type of process are going to really struggle.”
Preparedness
The harsh reality of the pandemic came as a surprise to some in the industry.
Firms have to have business continuity plans in place, but Moles said that “nobody” he knows had a strategy for this outbreak.
“Certainly, in my lifetime, this has never happened before,” he added. “I think if people are realistic, if they had a good business continuity plan, they could operate.
“Within a period of three days, we were able to move everyone on a staged basis into remote working.
“We then moved the phone system into the cloud, so everyone’s operating like they were sat at their desk.
“As a business, we also invested in additional technology at the back end of last year to make sure that clients can use things like DocuSign, so we don’t have to post things to people anymore.
“I think because of the way that technology was going, people were transitioning already into this type of world where you could do this. I just think it’s fast forwarded everything.”
Client communication
For financial advice firms, clients are the most important aspect of the business.
Being able to continue talking with them is vital and during times of social distancing businesses have to make sure the technology is in place to carry on communicating.
Moles said: “We, very early on in this crisis, moved our communication programme to every 48 hours with clients, and that’s just a blog or a piece of information.
“We put a video out to them a couple of weeks ago about our business continuity plan, and how it’s working, and also we had a podcast go out to them a few days ago about the investment world.
“What we found is that clients don’t just want to get emails from me, they want to see you. I think the ability to record and promote videos right now is very important.
“And I think they’re just fed up of watching TV, or whatever they’re doing online, they want to see your face.”
Survival
The UK government and the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) have put several schemes and plans in place to ease the pressure among businesses in the country.
This includes the furlough scheme which went into effect on Monday. The programme funds 80% of workers’ wages, up to £2,500 ($3,089, €2,848) a month, if they are put on leave.
But, even with some help, could financial advice firms still go under?
“I genuinely hope not, but we’re also already hearing lots of firms are furloughing people,” said Moles.
“Ultimately, what we have to think about here are clients not the firms. They’re paying for service and they’re the ones that need that to continue.
“Whether the firm survives or not, we need to make sure there’s an industry when we come out of this, so that those clients can continue to be supported by the firms that do survive.”
