As you would have heard at our PD day presentations, we have completed a pilot of our new Active File Review process between January and March of this year. Around 30 advisers took part in the pilot, which involved a pre-vet review of (mostly) SOA’s before they were provided to the clients.

Feedback sessions via Zoom allowed the Advice Coaches to collaborate with participating advisers and their teams to resolve any potential compliance concerns, as well as identifying areas of improvement or best practice.

What worked well?

• Using Calendly allowed advisers to control the timing of their review and feedback sessions to ensure their clients would receive the advice at the time agreed.
• Participants embraced the intent of the program, often selecting more complex, difficult pieces of advice to obtain coaching and guidance. 
• The collaborative nature of the process allowed an open and objective dialogue to take place, resulting in a better advice document.  
• The feedback sessions were well received, with in-depth conversations resulting in great outcomes for clients and advisers alike.

 What will we look to improve? 

• The Active File Review process is a pre-vet process intended to allow feedback and amendments to be made prior to the advice being provided to the client. Our messaging didn’t quite get through with this, so on this occasion we reviewed a few files “after the fact”. We’re confident that as the process rolls out across the community, everyone will be on board with the requirements.
• During the pilot, we have made some tweaks to the question set and end reporting for the pre-vet file review. We will continue to review this with the aim to make it more efficient for us to complete, as well as easier to read and understand for you. Once we have finalised the question set, we will look to create a guide for each section to give you insights about what we look for in each section as we review your advice. 

 What next?

 Quarter 2 starts after Easter, and all advisers will have the opportunity to participate. We will break the quarter into two 6-week “windows”: 

If you are in the first window, you will receive an email shortly to let you know. The email outlines the process and contains a link to book in your Advice Coach when you are ready. 

With our new Advice Coach Nina Bailey on board for Queensland, we are all looking forward to helping you provide great advice to your clients in the coming quarter! Please contact Greg, Kerry or Nina if you have any queries.

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