You might have felt this frustration a few times: go to your app store, search for wealth planning advice, get bombarded with complex options – none of which does exactly what you need, all in one place.
With such disparate personal finance information to sift through it’s no wonder many people shrug their shoulders when it comes to financial planning. According to research, only around 1 in 3 (37%) declare themselves ‘full planners’: they have financial goals, and a plan in place to achieve them.
Put into context, that’s approaching 30 million over-18s in the UK who haven’t committed to wealth planning.
This might all sound like someone else’s problem. In reality, it gives us as a country a big problem. Consider some of these stats:
- 39% of UK adults don’t feel confident managing their money
- 63% actually believe they have no control over their finances
- 11.5 million have less than £100 in savings
- 55% find pensions too baffling to be able to save well for retirement
- 43% of pensioners are not engaged with how to manage residential care costs
The list goes on. By putting ourselves in this position, we’re collectively contributing to a society that isn’t financially literate and doesn’t enjoy the benefits that better wealth management can bring: a more efficient economy, effective services; basically, a better place to live.
Our wealth planning problems start at an early age. Only around half (52%) of children aged between seven and 17 claim to have had any meaningful financial lessons – and plenty of them pick advice up from family rather than in the state or private school system.
So, if society isn’t set up to make us all better at wealth planning driven by a greater level of financial literacy, for everyone’s benefit, then someone needs to take matters by the scruff of the neck.
At ADL we’re doing our bit. After years of planning and development, we’re unveiling our new, comprehensive wealth planning app: My Finances.
The app – initially available for Android devices, with iOS to follow soon – brings together a wider range of wealth planning calculators than any other tool. There will be 10 to start with, letting you tot up inflation impacts, consider equity release, understand investment gains, double your money, and make other easy calculations.
But it will also, uniquely, offer one-to-one access to a network of our partner wealth planning advisors. They cover aspects of financial planning spanning mortgage payments, pensions, commercial finance, accountancy and more.
Perhaps most importantly, as ADL and our collaborators seek to change the way the UK thinks about and manages money, My Finances will offer a full programme of coaching sessions, webinars and other content to build users’ financial knowledge with easy-to-consume, knowledge-building insights.
We’ve launched a landing page to share more information about the app and what it can do for you. We’ll make My Finances more visible on app stores and online via some exciting marketing initiatives. We’ll be contacting potential users to bring more people on board – and start to make the change we want to see. As our developers continue to work hard, and the app builds momentum, we will roll out further features to subscribers.
We’re committed to building a wealth planning ecosystem that supports our vision of a fully financially literate UK. As individuals, and a society as a whole, that can be a priceless contribution to a prosperous financial future.
