Two-thirds unhappy with FPA: survey

Jo-Anne Bloch

The Financial PlanningAssociation (FPA) has taken a blow after an authoritative Assirt/Wealth Insights report revealed most advisers believe it to be ineffective, disorganised and unprofessional.

Through a survey of more than 260 financial planners 71 per cent who were members of the FPA — the report revealed that a high percentage of both FPA members and non-members are dissatisfied with the association.

Specifically, it found that of those who dealt with the FPA enough to comment, two-thirds (63 per cent) were not satisfied with its performance.

One of the recurring themes to come out of the research focused on the FPA’s competency at promoting and defending the profession, which some respondents linked to the faltering strength of its brand.

Upon reviewing the findings, FPA chief executive Jo-Anne Bloch said this was not the first time she had been con_fronted by such a negative att_tude towards the association.

“Having travelled the country there clearly is a feeling that some of our members are not necessarily happy with our services,” she said.

“So what we need to do as an association is communicate much more strongly some of the things we are doing, we need to make some changes and we need to listen to what our members are saying.

“Let’s not forget also that a lot of the focus in the last couple of years has been on stabilising the FPA itself, but now that we are a stable and financially viable association, we need to take things to the next level and establish the fact that we are focused on our members.”

Bloch also acknowledged the importance of readdressing the needs of the association’s diverse membership.

“One of the things we will be doing is looking at segmenting our membership and understanding the different trends within our members,” she said.

“For example, graduates have really different needs to members looking at succession planning and large licensees are quite different from smaller licensees, so we need to look at delivering different services according to different needs.”