From last Friday, ANZ will no longer offer its Prime Access financial advice service to new customers and will phase it out for current customers over the next 18 months.
ANZ managing director private banking and advice, Mike Norfolk said the bank is determined to keep making improvements to the way it offers customers high quality and accessible advice.
“We know we need to think differently about how we do this, which is why we are taking a new approach to providing our customers ongoing advice and phasing out Prime Access as part of that.
“Our new service will give customers complete control of when and how they want to review their financial plan,” he said.
ANZ Financial Planners will talk to current Prime Access customers during their annual review to understand their ongoing needs and how the new advice model could best work for them. ANZ said the new service will also provide customers with greater choice of regular financial reviews.
It comes after ANZ unveiled its plan to improve financial planning 12 months ago, which included the removal of all sales incentives for financial planning bonuses and speeding up customer remediation.
Prime Access was first offered in 2003. ANZ started a fee reimbursement approach in 2015 for customers that did not receive an annual documented review as part of their Prime Access package between 2006 and 2013. The Australian Securities and Investments Commission accepted this approach as part of an enforceable undertaking in 2018.
can the white knight save them too
It is very typical of the Banks, hire somebody with no real on the ground experience into a key leadership role … because these leaders have to make their mark quickly they think they have to make a big big change. Introduce something different.
Mike Norfolk will not be there in a couple of years yet with the change he has made essentially locks in more losses for the FP Division of the ANZ Bank. Luke Symons (former leader in FP) big change was to introduce an ipad that no FP uses, and the introduction of the Grow for Advice App which provides non-compliant insurance advice because it does not compare client’s existing insurances to the recommended insurance product (and ANZ are still pouring money into it). The algorithms are designed in the app to recommend an ANZ APL product and they tell their Planners it is complaint. But Client File Audit results have exposed the truth.
In reality they just have to stop hiring head office staff who have no business background on the essentials of running an FP business. They spend their time making the advice process more complex, adding unnecessary layers & processes – to justify their job.
At the end of the day no Financial Planner at ANZ is going to work hard anymore as ANZ keep making the advice process more complex, add process after process, add ambiguity to their roles – ANZ has successfully taken passionate Planners & made them into high paid admin officers who job is to cut & paste Fact Find information into their Coin software so their Paraplanners do not have to do it.
Now ANZ are getting rid of their Ongoing Relationship clients who need help, need guidance, are happy to pay for Advice… all because these so called Leaders did not invest in / hire the right people with REAL EXPERIENCE in running an FP business to develop the right processes & systems to be able to deliver quality compliant timely advice.
Mike Norfolk is moving the FP business into a one off transaction business. Sure Mr Client we can do some advice with you but after that you are on your own is the KEY message to take … and all headoffice staff bow
Well done Shayne Elliott … hiring Mike Norfolk … you have just locked in more losses for ANZ FP
Dear Declan,
1. You should re-read the announcement. ANZ Bank are NOT moving to “stop providing financial advice” (to quote you) They have ceased one type of FP service offering only – that being the Prime Access service.
2. Sure Mr. Norfolk has some UK experience however your point regarding a “clean out” is ambiguous. Are you suggesting that people with no qualifications whatsoever or relevant experience at all should be put in senior advice leadership positions to counter the problems of the past? That being your point you would find, if you checked, that under qualified people like Jack Regan and others like him were the very source of most of the problems in the first place as they were not advice professionals and they could care less about advice clients.
To the bloke with the CV check, you might want to look again. Seems to have quite a bit of experience in private banking and organisational transformation. I’ve seen first hand how shoddy the ANZ financial planning business model was and not just ANZ but the bank internal financial advice industry needs a thorough clean out. Their move is not unlike any other banks move to stop providing financial advice and timely.
Highlights from the public LinkedIn CV of Mike Norfolk, MD Private Banking and Advice at ANZ Bank as of today;
– Not on on the Financial Adviser Register
– Not registered with the TPB
– No business degree. Holds a 1993 Bachelor & 1994 Masters of English Literature from the University of Canterbury New Zealand
– Not a Member of a Professional Association
– No financial advice experience in Australia that I can see
– In Australia since 2014. Prior to that 6 years in the UK.
Fantastic! Nice work Shayne to have this guy in charge of your financial advice division giving directives to your Bank Planners whose qualifications and professional experience vastly exceed the above.