Superannuation and social security issues are the leading topics financial advisers are currently seeking more information about, according to OnePath.
“The main question we’re getting from advisers is about excessive contributions, so those advisers and their clients who have either received or are just about to receive excessive contribution notices from the ATO (Australian Taxation Office), that would be our biggest question at the moment,” OnePath Australia national technical manager Graeme Colley said.
Social security was another key issue advisers were asking for more information about, Colley said.
“The main questions we’re getting on social security are changes in the pension rates at the moment,” he said.
“They happen twice a year, so if we didn’t get questions in March on changes to social security rates we’d be pretty worried because it means that advisers aren’t paying any attention to those changes and how they might be able to tweak the client’s circumstances to gain that little bit extra pension.”
He noted aged care was becoming more of an area of interest for advisers than it had been in the past.
“I think the reason for that is that advisers are now looking around for fee-for-service propositions,” he said.
“While some of them think that aged care is a little bit strange because ‘what am I really going to make money out off, will it be the advice that I give those clients or will it be a generational thing, how am I going to develop a business out of it?’, we see it as being a long-term strategy that they would get involved in.
“Because it’s not only getting mum or grandpa or grandma into a nursing home, it’s getting them assessed under the arrangements.”
