Can you trust your IFA?

The delayed Retail Distribution Review (RDR) will force independent financial advisors (IFAs) to switch from collecting commissions on the products they sell to charging consumers directly for the advice they issue. So, how will the changes effect you and are the fees worth it? James McKeigue explains.

Anxious independent financial advisers (IFAs) may be breathing a little easier. A Treasury Select Committee has recommended that the implementation of the Retail Distribution Review (RDR) be pushed back until January 2014. If adopted though there's no guarantee it will be it would give IFAs that still aren't up to speed a little more time to adapt to its proposals. But where does it leave you?

Scheduled originally to come into effect a year earlier, the RDR will not only require IFAs to be better qualified, but it will also stop them from earning commission on the products they sell. They will instead charge clients directly. This radical shake-up aims to end the current cosy situation whereby advisers receive commissions from the companies whose products they recommend. Unsurprisingly, many IFAs are not fans of the change so last week politicians threw them a lifeline, ignoring protests from those IFAs who have already made the necessary changes.

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James McKeigue

James graduated from Keele University with a BA (Hons) in English literature and history, and has a certificate in journalism from the NCTJ. James has worked as a freelance journalist in various Latin American countries.He also had a spell at ITV, as welll as wring for Television Business International and covering the European equity markets for the Forbes.com London bureau. James has travelled extensively in emerging markets, reporting for international energy magazines such as Oil and Gas Investor, and institutional publications such as the Commonwealth Business Environment Report. He is currently the managing editor of LatAm INVESTOR, the UK's only Latin American finance magazine.