{"id":276020,"date":"2025-11-10T19:18:12","date_gmt":"2025-11-10T19:18:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/276020\/"},"modified":"2025-11-10T19:18:12","modified_gmt":"2025-11-10T19:18:12","slug":"software-is-playing-a-larger-role-in-financial-plans-what-does-that-mean-for-financial-planners","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/276020\/","title":{"rendered":"Software is playing a larger role in financial plans. What does that mean for financial planners?"},"content":{"rendered":"

Open this photo in gallery:<\/a><\/p>\n

Clients are looking for more sophisticated planning software that can manage multiple goals at once and run \u2018what-if\u2019 analyses.ToucanStudios\/iStockPhoto \/ Getty Images<\/p>\n

As financial planning software takes a bigger role in guiding client decisions, advisors can use the new tools to build scale or go deeper with existing clients.<\/p>\n

FP Canada and financial planning software vendor Conquest Planning Inc. launched an educational course for planners called Conquest Ready in October. <\/p>\n

The course targets financial planners who want to use Conquest\u2019s product, providing a \u201csandbox\u201d environment in which financial planners can work through fictional case studies using the platform. <\/p>\n

The partnership with Conquest is FP Canada\u2019s first with a software vendor, although it\u2019s open to more, according to Alexandra Macqueen, vice-president of learning, development and professional practice. She has been using financial planning software for 20 years and believes it has evolved considerably over that time.<\/p>\n

Two areas of innovation in financial planning software stand out for Ms. Macqueen. The first is its ability to visualize the outcome of financial decisions. <\/p>\n

\u201cYou and the client can see the impact in real time,\u201d she says. \u201cIf you retire later, or save more, or retire earlier, or pay down your mortgage faster, you can dynamically see changes in the financial plan in a way that just wasn\u2019t possible before.\u201d<\/p>\n

The second is the integration of artificial intelligence. Its ability to run many simulations at the same time to track multiple scenarios makes it valuable for financial planners, she says.<\/p>\n

Large institutions are embracing financial planning software. After years of running its own proprietary software, Edward Jones Canada is now making the transition to Conquest Planning in a roll-out that will finish by the end of April 2026.<\/p>\n

Edward Jones Canada\u2019s previous software handled simple, single-goal planning such as retirement, education or vacation planning, explains Julie Petrera, the firm\u2019s director of financial planning.<\/p>\n

\u201cWhat a lot of clients want now is holistic planning,\u201d she says. <\/p>\n

Rather than examining one goal at a time, they want to manage them in concert, running \u201cwhat-if\u201d analyses that show what adjusting one goal does to the others. <\/p>\n

\u201c[Financial] planning itself, and how clients want to be served, has led this evolution. So, we\u2019re moving toward software that will better serve our clients,\u201d she says.<\/p>\n

Financial planning\u2019s robo moment?<\/p>\n

Although Conquest Planning works mainly with large institutions<\/a> and has reseller agreements for companies that work with independent advisors, another financial planning vendor, Adviice, offers accounts for financial planners along with a do-it-yourself version accessible to consumers at $49 annually. <\/p>\n

The company, which focuses on decumulation planning, has a few thousand consumer users with $5-billion in assets under guidance for those accounts, says Owen Winkelmolen, its founder and a certified financial planner (CFP) in London, Ont.<\/p>\n

Is DIY financial planning software a threat to financial planners? When robo-advisors first appeared, many advisors worried the platforms would eat into their business by reducing customers\u2019 need for advice. Generally, though, investors still want human help.<\/p>\n

Robo-advisors looked at portfolios without considering the broader aspects of the client\u2019s finances, Mr. Winkelmolen says. And Adviice\u2019s consumer accounts are best used in conjunction with advice from a CFP, who can provide additional perspective.<\/p>\n

The decision on when to start drawing Canada Pension Plan (CPP) benefits is an example of where advice from a financial planner can complement quantitative analysis from software, he says.<\/p>\n

\u201cEven though starting CPP at a certain age has a financial implication, there are also a lot of soft factors involved,\u201d he says \u2013 such as a client\u2019s longevity, health and financial psychology \u2013 that can\u2019t be easily put in an algorithm. \u201cAnd so marrying that up with the financial implications will become quite important.\u201d<\/p>\n

There\u2019s also a coaching aspect to financial planning that software can\u2019t handle, Ms. Petrera says. <\/p>\n

\u201cRecommendations are useless unless they\u2019re implemented,\u201d she says. \u201cThe advisor remains part of the relationship to take the client through implementing the recommendations that were made by the software and the advisor. Our data tells us that this is what clients want.\u201d<\/p>\n

Lead generator<\/p>\n

Some see basic financial planning software functioning as a lead generation mechanism for CFPs. <\/p>\n

Conquest Planning offers a module that creates guidance for clients automatically based on minimal data. It targets clients of banks who might not have a personal relationship with an advisor or financial planner. <\/p>\n

Specifically, the software provides some financial context for the customer using only basic information such as their birthday, location, salary and account data, says Ken Lotocki, chief product officer at Conquest Planning.<\/p>\n

When they\u2019re ready to talk to the bank, they can reach out for a conversation. <\/p>\n

\u201cThere\u2019s a button that says, \u2018Go work with an advisor,\u2019\u201d he notes. <\/p>\n

Alternatively, a bank monitoring for partly or fully filled-out online financial plans might take the initiative to contact a customer and offer a meeting.<\/p>\n

Meanwhile, for financial planners, adopting financial planning software can go two ways. Some might choose to scale up their client base by offering tutorials and videos to thousands of clients, all using DIY software in what Mr. Winkelmolen calls a \u201cone-to-many\u201d model. <\/p>\n

Or, as Ms. Macqueen says, they can retain the same number of clients but create more intense relationships that go deeper into the complexities of a client\u2019s financial affairs.<\/p>\n

Ultimately, it\u2019s up to the CFP to choose their business model, she notes. <\/p>\n

\u201cWhether it\u2019s deeper with the same number of clients, or extending out to encompass more clients, this is about how they want to run their practice.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Open this photo in gallery: Clients are looking for more sophisticated planning software that can manage multiple goals…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":276021,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[14],"tags":[21366,64,63,99,186,61229,21363,184,185],"class_list":{"0":"post-276020","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-personal-finance","8":"tag-appwebview","9":"tag-au","10":"tag-australia","11":"tag-business","12":"tag-finance","13":"tag-globe-advisor","14":"tag-noastack","15":"tag-personal-finance","16":"tag-personalfinance"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276020","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=276020"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/276020\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/276021"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=276020"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=276020"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=276020"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}