The delivery of compliance documents to investors in Canada has been almost 100% via print & mail.  Investors have received thousands of prospectuses and other compliance documents in the form of multi-page printed books wrapped in polybags or envelopes and most of these packages have moved from our mail boxes directly to the blue box.  When Point of Sale 3 came into effect in May 2016, the industry anticipated that the Fund Fact might be the tipping point for electronic delivery to investors.  Much of this expectation came from the fact that Point of Sale requires delivery of the Fund Fact in advance of booking the trade – and the only practical way to deliver documents in a very short window of time is electronically.  The other driving force for Fund Facts e-delivery is the document itself – the Fund Fact is a 2-4 page templated document that is well designed for e-delivery, compared to a multi-page prospectus which is not.  The benefits of e-delivery are clear to all – huge cost savings, significant environmental benefits and higher customer satisfaction by catering to the investor’s choice of delivery channel.  So what is the verdict??

After a very short sample period (May-August 2016), our 15 Investment Dealer clients have delivered over 1.1M Fund Fact documents – and 87.3% of all documents have been delivered electronically.  Keep in mind that the North American average for e-delivery in Wealth Management hovers around 9%.  Fund Facts have moved this needle by a factor of 10X! 

So could this be the e-migration tipping point?  Could Fund Fact e-delivery success be the trigger that drives investors to request or demand more e-delivery?  We think that this is very likely and another positive influence towards driving higher levels of e-migration for our clients.

Tags: Financial Services