The quality of information potentially available more easily to advisers “can only be a good thing in the decision-making process, which advisers are well-placed to help with”, according to John Kelly, consultant at Mattioli Woods.
As Philip Brown, head of policy for LV=, comments: “Taking advice is vital for consumers to make the most of their pension pot.
“We believe the pensions dashboard has the potential to encourage more people to take advice, by pointing them towards taking advice, directing them to the appropriate advice channels and to the new guidance body, if they are not taking advice.”
This is also the view of The Pensions Portal's Mr Kirby, who says: “We believe, if presented in the right way, the dashboard will open opportunities for advice, as the breadth of a person’s assets (or the lack of) is more readily understood.
“The challenge will be to ensure that once consumers have engaged with it, they recognise the value and power of advice and the route to it is seamless.”
Time-saving administration
LV=’s Mr Brown also comments the dashboard could help cut down the amount of administration time an adviser would usually spend on one client.
He explains: “The dashboard could drive down the time and cost that advisers normally spend collating a client’s information, enabling advisers to service more consumers, including those with smaller pots.
“It should also make it easier for consumers, as they won’t need to do as much preparation before seeing an adviser.”
For Fiona Tait, technical director of Intelligent Pensions, the fact they would no longer have to send off tiresome requests to pension providers would be a boon for financial advisers.
She comments: “Data collection is a large part of the advice process and of course some clients will no longer want to pay for this.
“I don’t think this is a bad thing. Advisers could concentrate on building up their knowledge of the client, helping them to make the decisions most likely to benefit them in the future.
“This is a better use of their skills than constantly chasing pension providers for information, which has long been a source of great frustration.”
Mr Howorth is also confident that many advisers could overcome the challenges that consumer control and technological advances might bring, by using the dashboard’s bank of client data to make “information gathering and advice provision more efficient, helping with the onboarding process and attracting new business”.
However, he says that to achieve this, it will be important that the quality and quantity of the data on the dashboards is sufficient for advisers.
