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Conversation ‘Starter’? AARP Unwraps ‘Interview an Advisor’ Tool

AARP has launched an online tool they say is designed to help individuals select a financial advisor.

The aptly named “AARP Interview an Advisor,” launched this week by AARP and the North American Securities Administrators Association (NASAA), is free, optimized for mobile use, and doesn’t require AARP membership. The “interview” walks the user through a short series of suggested questions to ask a financial professional – though the casual user isn’t likely to walk away with much that could actually help them make a decision.

The process starts with a quiz – that is presented again once the interview questions have been completed to “see if your answers change” (though one is never told what the “correct” answers are). Those starter questions are whether an advisor needs a license (the only question to which the quiz provides an answer), how advisors are paid, whether investment returns are guaranteed, and whether the advisor is required to put the client’s best interests first.

From there the authors suggest a conversation starter focused on the advisor’s overall investment philosophy and how often they review a client's portfolio and recommend changes. At that point, the questionnaire begins, including a place for the individual to take note of:


  • the licenses/professional designations of the advisor,

  • the services and products provided;

  • the types of investments offered;

  • whether a written analysis will be provided;

  • how often the advisor will meet with them;

  • if there are restrictions to proprietary products; and

  • if returns are guaranteed.


The questionnaire then turns to issues on how the advisor is paid, how that is disclosed and whether the advisor relationship falls under a “best interests” or a “suitability” standard.

Then What Happens?

That said, once you’ve logged the questions, apparently it just feeds an AARP database where, according to a press release, they are “aggregated online for AARP’s research purposes.”

No personal information is requested or entered – and, short of printing out the screens, no materials are produced to actually guide the selection (in fairness, AARP posts a prominent disclosure that they are “not providing financial advice or recommending any individual financial advisor”). Indeed, while the tool provides the questions, there is really nothing to help the uninformed know what the “right” (or at least preferable) responses would be, other than by inference.

However, as part of the process, consumers do have the option to provide their name and e-mail address to subscribe to AARP’s monthly Money Matters newsletter.

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