IWL releases refreshed VisiPlan software
IWL has completed an upgrade of its VisiPlan advisory software on the same day the Genesys financial planning dealership announced that it was replacing it with Xplan.
VisiPlan version 7.2 was 12 months in the making and, according to advisory services manager Phillip Thomas, contains the most significant enhancements of any release of the popular desktop planning product.
Thomas said the upgrade concentrated on practice and client management functions.
“One of the main improvements is it’s now easier to keep a history of documents, to keep an audit trail. You can also save Microsoft Office documents in VisiPlan,” he said.
VisiPlan 7.2 also contains the practice management program Bizmax, which IWL acquired in 2003.
As for the loss of large client Genesys, Thomas said: “The Genesys story is an interesting one. They weren’t looking for a piece of advisory software per se, because they already have their own CRM [client relationship management] program, Atlas.
“What they’ve got from Xplan are additional web-based functions that they can fit into their Atlas program.”
Thomas said IWL would continue to enhance its own web-based planning tool, VisiWeb, by merging it with its desktop VisiPlan software.
He added that more enhancements to VisiPlan were in the pipeline.
“Our next release will be before the end of the financial year and, amongst other features, will include eForms — forms electronically completed from the data held in VisiPlan.”
Upgrades to VisiPlan 7.2 are complimentary because customers pay an annual licence fee, and will be made on a state-by-state basis over the next month.
According to Thomas, VisiPlan now has a 40 per cent piece of the adviser software market.
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