The Personal Finance Society has backed calls for the Government to remove the term ‘advice’ from all branding, marketing and communications associated with the formation of its new single public financial guidance body which will replace the Money Advice Service.

In its submission to the Government’s public financial guidance consultation, lodged this week, the professional body argued that use of the ‘advice’ label continues to confuse consumers and the general public.

A number of financial advisers and planners have been critical of MAS using the word ‘advice’ in its title.

It seems likely now that the replacement for MAS will drop the word advice from its title. In an exclusive interview with Financial Planning Today recently, MAS chief executive Caroline Rookes said that using the word advice in the name had stirred antipathy among the financial adviser community from the start.

A single organisation will replace MAS, The Pensions Advisory Service and Pension Wise. The aim is to have a new merged organisation in place after autumn 2018. MAS, TPAS and Pension Wise will continue to run until the new body is launched.

Ms Rookes told Financial Planning Today: “They’ll change the name because the name has caused a lot of problems, not least with financial advisers who thought from the outset that we would be providing regulated advice, which we don’t. So I think they’ll almost certainly change the name of it.
The PFS suggests that the creation of a new single guidance body offers the “perfect opportunity” to clearly differentiate the services offered by the new body from those offered by a regulated professional adviser, by aligning terminology and using the term ‘advice’ only when specifically referring to regulated financial advice provided by a professional financial adviser.

Personal Finance Society chief executive Keith Richards said: “We have consistently called for terminology that is consistent with the service being offered and more intuitive for consumers to understand. Guidance which may signpost consumers to regulated financial advice when required should not be called advice.”

The society’s calls for clarity date back to 2014, when chief executive Keith Richards wrote to both the Money Advice Service (MAS) and The Pension Advisory Service (TPAS), recommending they replace the word ‘advice’ in their names with ‘guidance’, to portray their service more accurately from a public interest perspective.

As well as seeking further clarity of terminology, the PFS is also urging the new guidance body to:

o Instil trust and confidence in the financial advice market by positioning guidance as a signpost, not a substitute, to the retail financial services market;

o Bridge the gap between public guidance and regulated advice by implementing a statutory objective to work more closely with the financial advice sector, including facilitating follow-up actions with the sector.