Insurers need to weigh up the risk of alienating IFAs after apparent increase in interaction with end customers post-RDR, Capita has warned.
Steve Wright, financial services market director at Capita's consulting business, said anecdotal evidence suggests there has been an increase in volume of interaction by insurers with end customers but reasons varied.
He said: "Perhaps the customer has chosen not to pay for advice or the IFA has ceased trading. Insurers need to weigh up whether this is an opportunity or a risk for them and how they can manage dealing directly with some customers without alienating intermediaries.
"We will be scrutinising data over the next few months to see whether this trend gathers pace."
The conclusion of a recent roundtable, hosted by Capita and attended by senior financial services professionals, found there were "unintended consequences" of the RDR that were starting to surface.
Wright added people with small pension post were particularly likely to be left self-serve as the industry developed commission-free after the implementation of RDR.
Steve Wright continued: "Finalising RDR design was a challenge for our customers as they decided how they wanted to implement RDR. It was definitely not a case of ‘one size fits'.
"However, all of our clients successfully went live on time and we are now working with them to understand how their customers will react in a post-RDR world."
