IFA firm Helm Godfrey has just announced an eightfold increase in profits following a major restructuring.
The London-based wealth management and employee benefits adviser reported pre-tax profits up from £55,000 to £461,000 for the financial year ending April 2015. Turnover was £8.15m, compared with £7.8m.
Helm Godfrey Chief Executive Graham Cross said: “Our decision to restructure the business last year by integrating our separate wealth and employee benefits divisions under a single brand and management structure has been an important factor in our increased profitability. We also invested heavily in new systems as we transitioned to a fully RDR-compliant business. With those costs now absorbed, our profitability is much improved and the move to fee-based advice and adviser charging has been good for business.
“Trading conditions have also been healthy and the outlook is extremely positive, with pension freedoms and the continued expansion of auto-enrolment in workplace pensions generating increased demand for our services.
“Looking ahead, we see great opportunities for the further development and roll-out of our cutting-edge flexible employee benefits platform iChoose. We will also be investing further in our in-house staff training programme. This offers employees career progression, by giving support staff the opportunity to train to become paraplanners and helping paraplanners to become fully qualified advisers.
“As a growing business, we will also be looking to recruit new staff, in all areas from advisers to administrative support roles.”
