The industry super fund announced in June its plans to build an in-house advice division.
Cbus head of advice and retirement Greg Harper later told ifa that the new service model is intended to ensure advisers comply with best interest duty as well as complement the fund’s referral relationship with the FPA.
According to a statement yesterday, the new Cbus services will commence on 31 October and utilise more than 20 specialist financial advice roles. There will be an “increased emphasis on effective communication and ‘end-to-end’ service delivery”, the statement said.
Midwinter and Cbus are in the process of implementing Midwinter’s cloud-based scaled advice solution, AdviceOS, for Cbus’ advice-over-the-phone service.
In the statement, Mr Harper said, “We were looking for simple and efficient software solutions that aligned with the fund’s capacity and desire to deliver optimal outcomes for our members nationwide. Midwinter ticked all these boxes.
“Maximising our member’s financial situation and retirement outcomes is our mission. Our integrated financial advice services and the partnership with Midwinter will help to achieve this goal.”
Midwinter managing director Julian Plummer said, “We are delighted to be working with Cbus and continuing to expand our services within the superannuation fund space.
“By partnering with Midwinter, Cbus will ensure that their members are receiving advice that is being generated using state of the art cloud-based technology from a trustworthy provider.
Some years ago the union super funds purchased the silence and cooperation of the commercial funds management sector by offering outsourced mandates. The FSC (IFSA) was happy to turn a blind eye to the outrageously misleading advertising and PR campaigns run by the union funds in the retail sector, because they were getting juicy wholesale mandates from them. Over time the union funds have brought more and more funds management inhouse, to direct it to “union friendly” investments. The commercial funds management sector has let the union lies go unchallenged for so long, they are now accepted as fact by the majority of gullible consumers, and it is increasingly difficult for commercial managers to claw back the lost business.
And so history repeats. The unions buy the silence of the FPA on union funds’ outrageous anti-advice lies, by throwing the FPA a bone of some union fund referral arrangements. Then what happens? Union funds gradually bring advice inhouse. Some people never learn.