Banking giant Barclays has said it wants to tackle the UK’s advice gap and give more people the confidence and support to invest their savings.
It has launched a service called Barclays Plan & Invest in a bid to fight this problem.
Customers will complete an in-depth questionnaire on their circumstances and what they want to achieve by when, along with a personality assessment on how they respond to risk.
Barclays will use technology to combine this information with their team’s pick of investments, to create a personalised plan that can follow over 10,000 investment paths.
It has partnered with Scalable Capital to launch the service, which will give customers access to the bank’s pick of both active and passive funds through a managed portfolio.
Details
The service will initially be piloted with Barclays current account customers who have at least £5,000 ($6,255, €5,507) to invest and will be accessed through online banking, with dedicated support over the phone.
The bank will continue to develop the service over the coming months, with plans to launch on the Barclays app later this summer.
The unveiling coincides with research that found over half of Brits (56%) feel that they don’t currently have access to the expert support they would need to start investing, with 71% believing that they don’t have the skills or expertise to invest on their own.
Dirk Klee, chief executive of wealth management and investments at Barclays, said: “Over the last few months, we’ve seen a rise in the number of people wanting to invest for the first time and it feels more important than ever that we give people the right tools and advice to plan for their financial future.
“We launched Plan & Invest after listening to our customers, who said they wanted an investment service that gave them the convenience and affordability of robo-advice, but with more of the personalisation of wealth management.
“I firmly believe that everyone should have access to affordable advice and Plan & Invest is just the first step in our plans to open up the tools we use with our wealth clients to more people.”
Cost
The service is free for customers to create their initial personalised investment plan and they will only be charged once their accounts are set-up and their money has been invested.
Once a portfolio is set-up, Barclays will charge an ongoing annual fee of between 1.39% and 1.59%, which is charged based on the value of their investments and split into two types of costs, which are service costs and product costs.
The service cost is fixed at 0.95% (+ VAT) and covers planning, investing and safekeeping costs.
The product costs cover ongoing fund management fees and transaction fees and will range between 0.25% and 0.45%, depending on which funds are chosen for a customer’s personalised investment plan.
- Service cost – 0.95 + VAT = 1.14%
- Product cost – 0.25-0.45%
- Total annual cost – 1.39-1.59% (inc VAT)
End of life planning
Elsewhere, UK banking group Natwest has rolled out a free digital service that helps simplify and consolidate end of life financial planning.
The NatWest Plan Ahead tool is available to customers in England and Wales.
It features an online portal which asks customers a series of questions about the arrangements in place for the end of their lives.
Topics discussed include funeral preferences, financial planning and creating a will. Customers are guided through the process with personalised support from Natwest.
Wendy Renshaw, chief digital information officer at Natwest, said: “Planning for the future can sometimes be an overwhelming, daunting task and often one we’d rather not think about.
“This new service will help enhance people’s financial confidence and capability, as well as giving peace of mind for the future.
“Through innovative digital technology, it can reduce the risk of unexpected costs or administrative difficulties for friends or loved ones at a difficult time.”
