WCFP boosts development support

IOOF-owned Winchcombe Carson Financial Planning (WCFP) has struck up a strategic alliance with computer solutions company Bstar to enhance the practice management platform provided to its advisory network.

Head of Winchcombe Carson Scott Monotti said the partnership was formed to help address the two most pressing issues facing advisers at the moment: growing the practice and succession planning.

“Bstar has developed a range of tools, particularly financial indicators and key performance indicators, that help advisers genuinely understand, measure and monitor the process of the business,” he said.

“If you go through that process, what you often end up with is a business that has defined its processes of how it works, implemented systems to embed those business rules and, by default, a more efficient, compliant and profitable business,” Monotti explained.

At the other end of the spectrum, the Bstar tool aids succession planning by allowing practice owners to more accurately value their businesses, which in turn allows potential buyers to more easily determine the consideration they are willing to pay to acquire the practice.

“What we say to the older guys on the exit trail is if we can package your business up so that you do have a proper service offer, you do have a proper value proposition, and you have systems and processes in place that will automatically mean that you will gain a higher value for your book, because most of the young people wanting to buy are looking at financial ratios. They want to buy something based on EBIT [earnings before interest and tax],” he said.

WCFP has also established alliance relationships with some of the major banks through Bstar, which allows planners easier access to business finance.

“The reason that works really well is that when they go to get finance, the program we’ve put them through is very similar and probably more arduous and thorough than what the bank would put them through,” Monotti said.

“We can then go to the bank and say this is their business model, this is their true P and L [profit and loss], here’s their business plan and their ability to pay back loans, and that’s how we arrange finance for them as well,” he added.

Bstar is a web-based application that members of the dealer group take to practitioners as part of a half-day workshop to gather all of the relevant information that needs to be entered into the system.