More often than not, employees who obtain investment advice do not follow it. And that’s among those who bother to seek it in the first place. The Employee Benefit Research Institute’s 2014 Retirement Confidence Survey suggests that advisors have some work to do in boosting plan participants’ interest and confidence in professional advice.
Fewer that one in five employees — 19 percent — told EBRI that they have obtained professional investment advice. Of those, 27 percent of them followed all of it, 36 percent followed most of it and 29 percent followed some of it.
EBRI cited five main reasons for this:
- not trusting the advice: 34 percent of employees in the 2014 study, 33 percent in 2013;
- not being able to afford it: 20 percent of employees in 2014, 21 percent 2013;
- having their own ideas: 18 percent of employees in 2014, 16 percent in 2013;
- circumstances changed so the advice was no longer applicable: 4 percent of employees in 2014, down from 13 percent in 2013; and
- obtaining better advice somewhere else: 4 percent of employees in 2014, 6 percent in 2013.
- John Iekel is Senior Writer and Editor for ASPPA Net and NTSA Net.
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