I read with interest the recent Datamonitor report on IFAs’ use of Technology1. In particular I read with continued concern about the slow pace of movement to performing policy enquiries online. In their research, Datamonitor found only 31% of IFAs had made any policy enquiries online in the past 6 months.
When Datamonitor probed further, over 59% said the reason they still used the phone for enquires was the amount of information they can get via the phone is perceived as more while 32% cited the reliability of the information they receive online as the key issue.
This implies that there is still work to be done by providers in both enhancing and marketing their policy enquiry systems before take up is increased. Only then can the industry as a whole (for it has to be as a whole to be sustainable) benefit from the potential economies of scale.
1 Datamonitor – financial advisors views on technology – May 2008
