Count Financial has continued to grow its advice network at the expense IOOF’s acquisition of MLC Wealth with the company adding three more firms to its license, bringing the total number of firms recruited this year to 11 made up of 30 advisers.
The three further firms announced today as joining the Count Financial network have been drawn from under the Godfrey Pembroke, Meritum and Garvan licenses.
What is more, Count signalled that it is currently in due diligence with respect to other IOOF/MLC Wealth advice firms which could see it add close to 100 more advisers.
The firms are Sapphire Coast Financial Services, Next Generation Financial Planning and Aspire Financial Planning group.
The three recruits won over to Count are consistent with the company’s growth strategy and follow on from the Count’s 17 March announcement that it had recruited four former IOOF firms. Count Financial Limited (Count Financial) has announced that three former MLC firms are joining its national network of advice businesses.
The company noted that Sapphire Coast Financial Services is the fourth firm to join from Godfrey Pembroke, following the prior appointments of Ascent Private Wealth, Venture Financial Advisers and Plan Protect.
Commenting on the latest firms to join the Count license, the company’s Chief Advice Officer, Andrew Kennedy said the appointment of all three firms was a boost for the licensee which continued to target quality advice firms to join its network.
“Sapphire Coast, Next Generation and Aspire are three exceptional advice firms that we are delighted to have joining our national network. They bring experience and expertise which the rest of our Member network will be able to benefit from,” he said.
Comments
They love a headline these Count guys. But to be fair, they are absolutely cleaning up against their main rivals, GPS, Centrepoint, Matrix etc.
seriously these firms don't know that Count will do everything to make it hard for you to leave if you so decide down the track. Remember they have the anti-competitive no bulk transfer of clients (or rather no transfer of clients) so as to ruin you, and to also increase their own revenue when you leave clients behind.
Why would anyone get into a relationship to begin with knowing the stress they may come if it no longer works and you want to leave? insane.
Why would any practice untangle themselves from a dealer group, then allow themselves to become entangled by another dealer group? Why not just get your own licence? It really isn't as difficult or expensive as the dealer group spruikers make out.
Spot on Bear - they will happily accept the bulk client transfers from MLC and other licensees, and yet make you have every single client sign a change of adviser form if you wish to leave for another licensee? No hypocrisy or double standards there! We acquired a small Count financial planning list from some very good accountants in 2016 who wished to focus on their core business, and Count were nothing short of a nightmare. Cost all of us a bomb in time and real costs and didn't for one moment think about the client experience. Maybe they left that info out of the pitch?
Wouldn't it just be the right thing to do to get every client's authority to be transferred to another adviser?
Hi SD yes it would be but the manner of doing this by Count is what many have a problem with. The former adviser was leaving the profession and the accounting practice had been through a process that identified us as a good fit for their clients to transfer to us. Many licensees at this point write to the clients advising them of the intended change and giving them the option to "opt out" that if chosen by the client effectively makes them an orphan client of the existing licensee. Count however insisted every client needed to "opt in" even though they are happy for other licensees to transfer clients in bulk to their license after an "opt out" process. Double standards??? Furthermore if clients didn't provide the signed transfer authority Count formerly (may still?) wrote to these clients telling them they no longer had a Count adviser and would no longer receive advice. However they did NOT to turn off or rebate any commissions to these clients and were happy to bank these unearned profits to their license - they did however ensure fees were turned off for all clients - even those who had agreed to transfer to us via a signed consent. My hope is that the non CBA owned Count no longer engages in this sort of despicable conduct as it reflects poorly on all of us in the client's eyes. Anyone joining Count would be wise to read the fine print!
They did it before they were CBA owned. Moreover, they do it even if the adviser stays the same and moves. Yes a few million in unearned revenue they get from clients deliberately orphaned. It’s a scam everyone knows about and the RC knew and they touched on some it via the dead clients thing but they had so much other stuff to go through.
sounds like the dover client contracts or the hotel california
Spot on Richard. Read his last sentence. Exact same experience. People don't sign forms in bulk, and they know that. When I purchased a group of clients, 100. over the next two months, the Accountant (ex Count Adviser) rang 100% of clients, I as new adviser rang 80% of them, and I wrote to them twice, and we got 45-50% of forms returned. The form sits on the Kitchen table and the kids start yelling. Count kept the other 50 clients and the commissions from these orphans. The clients that came across I switched off the commission and charged them fee for service, annual agreements or disengaged over the following 12 months. You wonder why you're doing FASEA, commissions are banned and advisers have a poor name and I can point you in one direction.
If just one dealership (Count) is going to take over 10% of IOOF's adviser numbers they need to be taking this seriously.
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