Independent investment adviser Financial Engines has partnered with ADP to offer its independent and comprehensive advisory services to employers of all sizes, beginning in the summer. Under the agreement, ADP Retirement Services will offer its retirement services clients the option to engage with Financial Engines and its full suite of advisory services.
The program aims to allow ADP to expand its financial wellness capabilities that help 401(k) plan participants do a better job of managing day-to-day expenses and other financial challenges.
“ADP is excited to collaborate with Financial Engines to deliver to participants the value of its more than 20 years of experience providing personalized advice to participants,” says Chris Luongo, vice president product marketing and business development, ADP Retirement Services. “ADP and Financial Engines share the goal to leverage technology to improve participants’ experiences. This underscores ADP’s commitment to financial wellness and gives employees sound financial resources so they can be confident in their retirement planning and savings decisions.”
Financial Engines answered a request for proposals put out by ADP looking for a company to offer advice to its retirement clients.
Financial Engines offers many different advice services, including personalized online savings and investment advice and retirement income services for employees who want to manage their retirement themselves; professional management for participants who want to partner with and delegate the management of their retirement accounts to a financial professional; income planning and Social Security claiming guidance; and Personal Advisor, a service that offers personalized professional management for all participant accounts, comprehensive financial planning and a dedicated adviser.
“[The partnership] allows us to expand our ability to deliver financial help through the workplace and introduce directly a suite of financial wellness capabilities — including advisory services — to millions of employees,” says John Bunch, executive vice president and chief operating officer at Financial Engines. “This relationship enables us to provide unbiased financial help to employees who work for businesses of all sizes, and who may not have had access to Financial Engines’ market-leading, unconflicted services in the past. It also enables us to build deeper relationships, especially through our Personal Advisor service.”
If a company is on the ADP platform, they can take advantage of Financial Engines different value propositions, including online advice and tools, the managed account platform, face-to-face meetings, asset management, risk mitigation and income planning, Bunch says.
The partnership allows Financial Engines to reach 1.7 million plan participants in the 60,000 retirement plans managed by ADP.
“Twenty years ago we set out with a vision that is still alive today. We want to provide fiduciary-level advice to the masses. Typically that has been reserved just for the wealthy. We think our current offering, as well as what we do for ADP, allows everyday hardworking Americans to get fiduciary advice backed up by our track record of working with the largest companies in America,” Bunch adds.
Financial Engines was a pioneer in the robo-adviser space. That has morphed to include financial wellness and face-to-face financial planning. The only thing that hasn’t changed is that “at the core of everything we’ve done, we have always been a fiduciary,” he says. “We have always been bound by the legal requirement to do the right thing while many advisers didn’t have to meet that standard. It is part of our DNA. For others it is somewhat new.”
