LPL Financial Advisors Expected to Save Hours Each Month Using New Account Opening Process

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – Dec. 2, 2019 – LPL Financial LLC, a leading retail investment advisory firm and independent broker-dealer, today announced the launch of a new account opening tool designed to cut down the average time it takes an advisor to open a new account—from nine to four minutes, which could create hours of efficiencies gains each month.

The ClientWorks tool, New Account Opening 2.0, makes it easier and quicker for advisors to execute this vital step of the client management process. The enhanced experience simplifies the account opening process, with 30 percent fewer fields to complete, forms pre-populated with data already in ClientWorks—90 percent of all fields for existing account holders—and an intuitive design that makes the process easier to navigate. Fewer clicks, increased data accuracy and a simplified workflow enables advisors to save a significant amount of time that could be reinvested in efforts to enhance value with their clients and support their business growth.

“We don’t just build tools. We solve advisors’ problems. By closely examining advisor workflows and continuously seeking input and feedback from our advisors, we are able to understand where we can simplify, streamline and integrate workflows, helping advisors spend less time on tasks and more time on aspects of their business that create value with clients,” said Burt White, LPL Financial managing director, Investor & Investment Solutions. “In this case, by being able to reduce the average time to open a new account from nine minutes to four minutes, it implies more than 6,000 hours of monthly productivity created across all LPL advisors and staff. That’s impactful. We are accelerating the standard in financial services and changing what advisors should come to expect from technology, because that is what advisors and their clients need.”

The tool also affords greater transparency into monitoring new account opening activities, and the tool will offer integration with the internal and external systems advisors use every day, including eSignature and LPL’s proposal generation tool powered by AdvisoryWorld, providing advisors with an end-to-end workflow of the account opening process.

LPL Financial advisor John Shrewsbury, a participant in the tool’s pilot program, said, “It is simple enough for advisors to open new accounts without having to involve our client service specialists. This will allow us to redefine what our specialists spend time on. It will also help client engagement after the sale to skyrocket, because the client service specialist will have time to spend with them rather than push paper.”

Lean more about ClientWorks, LPL’s comprehensive, integrated business platform.

About LPL Financial

LPL Financial is a leader in the retail financial advice market and the nation’s largest independent broker-dealer*. We serve independent financial advisors and financial institutions, providing them with the technology, research, clearing and compliance services, and practice management programs they need to create and grow thriving practices. LPL enables them to provide objective guidance to millions of American families seeking wealth management, retirement planning, financial planning and asset management solutions.

*Based on total revenues, Financial Planning magazine June 1996-2019

The views and opinions expressed by the LPL Financial Advisor may not be representative of views of other Financial Advisors and are not indicative of future performance or success.

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