Our First Ever Press Release!

  

 

FINANCIAL ADVISERS TOWERS OF TAUNTON JOINS THE ELITE AS IT ACHIEVES CHARTERED STATUS

 

The Chartered Insurance Institute (CII) has awarded the prestigious 'Chartered Financial Planners' status to Towers of Taunton (Financial Services) Ltd, one of the South West's leading providers of financial planning and support.

 

Chartered status is an exclusive title only awarded to firms which meet rigorous criteria relating to professionalism and capability. All Chartered Financial Planners commit to the CII's Code of Ethics & Conduct reinforcing the highest standards of professional practice in their business dealings.  It also reinforces the high standard of work and experience of its practitioners.

 

Towers of Taunton (Financial Services) Ltd specialises in providing financial advice and planning to individuals at all stages of their lives and careers, offering a service which recognises happiness and wellbeing as well as assets as essential components of successful outcomes.  They have become recognised as one of the leading authorities in the UK on ethical and socially responsible investment as well as for their imaginative problem solving. 

 

Dr Robin Keyte, Director, who holds the individual Chartered Financial Planner title and is a Certified Financial Planner certificant, says that securing Chartered Financial Planners status is a landmark for his company: "We have always prided ourselves on being thoroughly professional in everything we do, and to receive external recognition in this way is very gratifying. As Chartered Financial Planners, we can signal our commitment to the highest levels of service to our customers."

 

To date, fewer than 100 firms in the UK have achieved Chartered status, indicating that this is a highly exclusive award reserved for the leading firms within the financial advice market.

 

For further information, contact Robin Keyte on: 01823 324432 or robin@towersoftaunton.co.uk

 

Notes to editors:

 

Towers of Taunton (Financial Services) Ltd

Director Robin Keyte has been a key figure in the development of industry standards for ethics through the Financial Services Authority Business Ethics Forum, and is a founding Director of Fair Money, a working group established to bring about better business ethics in financial services.  He was involved in drafting the International Standard of Financial Planning (ISO 22222), the syllabus for the current set of financial advice-related exams and the national standard for generic financial advice.

 

He is a founder member and current Chair of the Ethical Investment Association, and Director of the UK Social Investment Forum (UKSIF), helping UKSIF campaign for greater awareness of ethical investment in the financial services industry.

 

Robin has appeared on BBC Radio 4's Money Box Live, is consulted regularly by the DTI, and has been quoted in Which? magazine in association with their work on ethical investment (December 2006), and their investigations into the costs of financial advice (November 2007).

 

CII

 

The CII has 90,000 members in 150 countries and is the world's largest financial services professional body.

 

Serving the insurance, savings and financial services markets it works to enhance professional, ethical and technical standards.

 

The CII partners with corporate business to develop organisation-wide solutions to ensure competitive advantage through technical and professional competence of employees at every level.  Individually, CII's members keep up their personal development and maintain their professional standing though an unrivalled range of learning services.

Most people stuck in level annuity groove, NU finds

Submission to City Wire following article in new Model Adviser newspaper.

 

This piece is of no surprise to me, not because of any perceived failings in the advice given to annuitants that ignores future rises in living costs, but because any comparison of the total cumulative annuity payments receivable from a level pension versus an escalating pension shows the crossover point at which the escalating pension becomes better value is well into a person's 80's or sometimes their early 90's.

 

The cynic in me makes me think annuity providers view business in escalating annuities as nicely profitable.

 

What is more, I find it hard to shake that view when I see the rate of conversion of cash into escalating pension for the Universities Superannuation Scheme (USS).

 

Admittedly the USS does not have additional costs to meet like providing a return to shareholders, or paying commissions and other costs to support a distribution route through intermediaries.

 

However the last time I advised a client regarding the USS, open market annuity rates on a like-for-like basis were some 25% worse. 

 

So, a plea to providers of escalating annuities, give our clients a better deal.  

 

Robin Keyte

 

 

Dr R W Keyte  -  Director, Chartered Financial Planner & CERTIFIED FINANCIAL PLANNER CM      
Towers of Taunton (Financial Services) Ltd