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ISCOVER
Staff Reporter
Mortgage Choice has officially made the move into financial planning, soft launching the new arm earlier this week.
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Speaking about the soft launch, the general manager of the new arm, Tania Milnes, said the first franchisees to receive an in-house financial planner would open their doors to customers over the course of the next month.
"We anticipate having 60 financial planners operating across Australia in three years' time, keeping in mind that our stringent recruitment standards require our planners to hold a Diploma of Financial Services (Financial Planning) and have solid financial advice experience. We will continue to assess the quality of their advice against a best practice checklist,” she said.
Ms Milnes said the company had recruited a number of industry experts in a bid to help the Mortgage Choice Financial Planning company build the business foundations and develop propositions for both franchisees and consumers.
"We have recruited a team of industry experts and partnered with specialist investment research house, van Eyk, together with its leading practice management consultancy division, The Encore Group, to build a best in class dealer group," Ms Milnes explained.
"As part of our ongoing commitment to fulfilling the requirements of legislative reform, we also work very closely with Catalyst Compliance.
"Market-leading investment platform Macquarie Wrap, financial planning software Macquarie Visor, and revenue management software CommCentral REVEX, were selected as our key tools of trade after rigorous tender processes.
"Along with a broad, non-aligned Approved Product List, we've selected the top risk insurance providers in the market: Asteron, CommInsure, Macquarie Life, MLC, OnePath and TAL. We intend to extend the Mortgage Choice 'paid the same' philosophy across insurance, meaning our advisers have no financial incentive to recommend any one insurer over another."
Strong lead flow into the new business is expected through the 80,000 new customer enquiries Mortgage Choice receives each year, together with enquiries from its existing customers.
Furthermore, healthy conversion rates are anticipated as a direct result of leveraging brand equity and continuity.
"When you look at the forecasted growth across scaled advice, superannuation and risk insurance, our customers sit right across these growth segments and we know that by transitioning to a financial services business that we'll be able to satisfy their complete needs," Ms Milnes said.
"With institutional independence scarce and FOFA changing the competitive landscape, we firmly believe that the timing is right for Mortgage Choice to enter the market. We intend to challenge the status quo and make financial advice more accessible to all Australians.
"Currently only around 30 per cent of Australians seek professional financial advice. Our goal is to transform the need from optional to essential - with real, relevant and results driven financial advice.”
