Green, the company’s founder, made the comments in a recent interview at the London Stock Exchange where he also set out his growth plans for the future and the outlook for expats and international investors for 2016.
“Competitors sometimes will talk about charges and try and imply that theirs perhaps are lower than ours, although we are extremely competitive.
“At the end of the day it’s about value, and it’s about making sure you provide a great service for the public, and that your clients fully understand the charges. You need to disclose them and be transparent with those charges,” he said.
“Our clients aren’t concerned about charges. They are happy with our service. We know that from the feedback we get,” he said.
“We make sure our guys are rewarded but we don’t change the amount they are rewarded depending on commission paid."
Annual charges
The deVere chief executive also talked about the growth of fee-based services and disclosed that clients in countries such as the UK, the US and Australia now pay a 1% fee a year for financial advice, although he added that sometimes there maybe an initial set up fee.
“In countries where we have to go fee, we’re always going to charge 1% per annum,” he said.
However, he noted that in some other countries, clients currently pay no fees because financial institutions pay advisers commission for recommending their products to them.
He said: “We make sure our guys are rewarded but we don’t change the amount they are rewarded depending on commission paid by the institution.
“They get paid the same for recommending so that they can give generally good advice whatever institution they have recommended the client to. This way, the client gets best advice,” he said.
Green also said that it often “surprises people” that fees in the longer term can be more profitable than commissions.
To see the full interview please click here.
