What a time to be alive – today’s investor is reaping the benefits of digital transformation, both in their personal and business lives.
From increased efficiency and productivity to better customer experiences and satisfaction, service means something completely different now, compared to even just a few years ago.
The lucky ones will feel this in their financial life too.
They’ll be working with advisers who are leveraging the best digital tools and using them to provide a seamless experience.
That’s where we like to think we come in.
It’s been a busy few years for us as we’re working hard to combine the very best of Nucleus and James Hay. But now, with the benefits of our scale, we’re starting to unlock the opportunities and deliver a seamless experience that supports you in creating brilliant solutions for your clients.
Over the last year, the combined group has invested £4.5m in improving service and £12.6m in technology and transformation to make it easier for you to do business with us. And it’s the improvements in our service that we’re particularly proud of.
This is because we’ve been doing what we’ve always done best: make changes based on your feedback, rather than something that might sound or look good in a marketing brochure (or blog post!).
This spans both the current Nucleus Wrap and James Hay online platforms.
You said, we did: Nucleus Wrap
Just to give you a few examples on the Nucleus side: feedback told us it would be helpful for clients to be able to see their remaining ISA allowance, so we added a feature in Nucleus Go – our client-facing app – that would allow them to see the allowance remaining, including any replaceable withdrawal allowance.
You wanted help avoiding unnecessary delays to client payments. We’ve created a handy document which highlights some of the common reasons why a client’s regular withdrawal or income payment might not go out on time and how to avoid this from happening. You can find it here.
You said Live support queries could be answered quicker. We’ve set up a dedicated live support team who are answering 93% of messages in under two minutes, with the average being 43 seconds.
You also said call answer rates could be improved. We’ve improved our answer rates across adviser call lines, and we’re now consistently answering 97% of calls, with an average waiting time of 13 seconds.
James Hay Online
We’re acutely aware that service has been an area of frustration for some in recent years. We’re delighted that your feedback and our data tells us we’re now providing much more robust support and a consistently strong service.
Throughout 2022 and into Q1 2023, James Hay - and also Nucleus Wrap - demonstrated consistently strong performance against target service levels. Focusing on critical customer outcomes, end-of-month figures were well in excess of 95%, often achieving 100% performance.
We’ve also introduced quality metrics for our phone calls. Assessment of our Customer Service Centre telephone-based support in 2022 reported 93% of calls to be of ‘good quality’, with 62% achieving ‘gold standard’. This means that not only were the queries answered but the right signposting to next steps or full resolution were also completed with the adviser. Gold standard calls continue to rank at >60% in Q1 2023.
This focus on service is shared across the group – the Nucleus Wrap Client Solutions team also continue to maintain a 100% performance record across their 21 key customer areas.
Striving for even better service
We’re not resting on our laurels though. We’re continuing to invest in our people, the service we deliver and the all-round experience you receive. We’re doing this by:
- Reviewing our processes to establish how we can reduce end-to-end timeframes for a number of key actions/instructions.
- Launching an optimised inbound telephony experience, designed to help you get access to the support you need promptly and efficiently.
- Our Complaints handling team are introducing an ‘Initial customer contact strategy’ to make sure that any complainant receives a call within five days, reassurance that their concern will be fully investigated, their details clarified, and next steps confirmed.
We recognise that you – and your clients – have high expectations when it comes to excellent service and we hope you’re starting to see the benefit of our progress.