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Aifa misses the mark with life company appointment
06 September 2010
The appointment of Stephen Gay as director general of the Association of Independent Financial Advisers (Aifa) is truly disappointing. For those of you who don’t know him, Gay is director of distribution at Aviva. I’ve met him and he’s a perfectly capable and likeable guy but what is he doing heading up a trade body for IFAs? Call me daft but why not have, say, an adviser at the helm? IFAs are going through a multitude of regulatory and business changes, wranglings with the FSA, FSCS and FOS, and are defending their reputation following scandals such as Keydata and Cru. They need someone who can understand the problems faced by small businesses and fight their corner. In short they need a peer, not someone who has a life company mentality and vested interests. What’s he going to tell IFAs to do when the going gets tough? Sell more products or become tied? Let’s not forget that Aviva is the business which has made no secret of the fact that it wants to target orphan clients as part of its push into the mass market. Maybe the Aifa board doesn’t understand that Aviva’s strategy depends on IFAs leaving the market. I voiced concerns in my leader in New Model Adviser® two weeks about the direction of Aifa and this appointment fuels my fears further. In Aifa’s Advice Horizons report it told advisers that becoming restricted ‘had its advantages’ – I’m sure this opinion is one that Gay will wholly agree with. Aifa seems to have forgotten what the ‘I’ in its name stands for and by failing to appoint an IFA to the role of director general, it’s surely making it clear that the organisation is well on its way to become the AFA (that’ll be the Association of Financial Advisers). Published by CityWire
