Vertical integration is a bit like Communism. An investment or pension company having its own salesforce, in theory, should have similar benefits to those of the people owning the means of production, better organised, controlled, economies of scale. The reality is the opposite, bloated bureaucracies, managers managing managers, empty soviet supermarket shelves, and workers on the fiddle. Another full circle approacheth, I fear.
“Letter of authority: Why now is the right time for change”
This may sound like a non-issue from outside the world-of-financial-advice bubble. It is the bain, however, of the daily working lives of many of us, particularly of those paid by we advisers to do the dirty work of dealing with the many providers with whom we have to work.