News flash of the week?
RBS, the U.K.’s biggest taxpayer-controlled lender, is eliminating 618 branch-based financial advisors as new regulations force lenders to charge clients for the service. By the end of 2012, the Financial Services Authority’s Retail Distribution Review will prevent the payment of commissions to advisors, so the lenders are preparing to charge for the service.
Gavin Finch, reporting for Bloomberg News.com, on June 19, spoke with Unite labor union national officer, David Fleming, who said
“These latest RBS job losses are brutal; Unite, for some time has had major concerns about the appalling manner in which workers at the bank have been treated.”
As a counter, RBS spokesman Michael Strachan said in the statement,
“We will do all we can to support our staff, offer redeployment opportunities wherever possible, keeping compulsory redundancies to an absolute minimum.”
My bet is financial advisors will be running out the RBS doors in droves!