Our Remuneration Basis

One Quote Financial Brokers Ltd, act as an intermediary between you the consumer and the solution provider with whom we place your business.

One Quote Financial Brokers operates a “real value” ethos always ensuring full cost transparency. We conduct unbiased full insurer market comparison, offering the lowest fixed discount protection premium and the most competitive investment charges in the Irish Financial Broker space. 

The Background

Pursuant to provision 4.58A of the Central Bank of Ireland’s September 2019 Addendum to the Consumer Protection Code, all intermediaries, must make available on their website, a summary of the details of all arrangements for any commission provided to the intermediary to which it has agreed with its product providers, together with details of any direct fees which may be charged by the intermediary to the consumer.

What kind of intermediary are One Quote Financial Brokers?

One Quote Financial Brokers are not tied to any solution provider, nor do we have any provider allegiances, our purpose is to compare the market and to only recommend the most suited financial solutions at the most competitive cost, whilst always ensuring absolute transparency.

What is intermediary remuneration?

Remuneration is the payment earned by the intermediary for work undertaken on behalf of both the provider and the consumer. The amount of remuneration is directly related to the value of the products provided, which may may be way of commission, or where no commission is taken, via direct advisory fees.

What is Commission?

Commission is a payment that may be earned by an intermediary for work undertaken. It is paid by the product provider to the intermediary, with higher commission options increasing client costs and vice versa. We never choose maximum but opt for minimum commission levels, so as to maximise client value.

Maximum Market Commission

The financial regulator, makes it compulsory for all financial intermediaries to display the maximum product by product commissions levels, that a financial intermediary could possible take, if they imposed maximum charges on pension, or investment related recommendations, or if they do not choose to discount insurer protection premiums.

Intermediary commission options, that a financial intermediary may choose from, will therefore directly influence the cost imposed on you the client. Here you can find displayed the maximum commission rates that can be paid to other financial intermediaries, including financial brokers, should they seek to impose maximum costs. 

These commission levels do not apply to One Quote Financial Brokers, but may in the case of alternative, financial advisors and brokers operating on the Irish market.

It is very important to understand, that the ethos of One Quote Financial brokers, is to grant “real value” to each and every client, which includes receiving the minimum feasible commission rates, where commission applies. Unlike the majority of our competitors, One Quote Financial brokers always limit commission in our client’s favour. 

Types of Commission

There are different types of commission models, with protection based products (life insurance plans) paying both initial and renewal commission and investment based products offering, initial, renewal and trail commission.

With different commission terms defined below, its important to note that One Quote Financial brokers, will:

• Never take renewal commission on any investment or pension product
• Reduce both initial, and trail commissions, to typically half of that, made available to all financial intermediaries.

1. Initial commission/once off payment: where payment is made to the intermediary shortly after the sale is completed and is based on a percentage of the premium paid/amount invested. Initial commission is typically payable on all protection and investment products.

2. Renewal/service commission: where further annual payments are paid throughout the life span of protection products, as well as regular premium pension and savings plans. We do not take renewal commission on any investment related products always granting 100% investment allocation.

3. Trail/ongoing advice: Annual flat rate commission added to the annual management charge on investment-based products including pension plans.

Earned Commission Model

Indemnity Commission: This is the term used to describe a commission payment made before the commission is deemed to be ‘earned’. Indemnity commission may be subject to a claw-back (see below) if the consumer lapses or cancels the product before the commission is deemed to be earned. The typical earning period to avoid commission claw back is 5 years from policy inception.

Sustainable Factors – Investment/IBIPs/Pensions Advice

Our remuneration policies are consistent with the integration of sustainability risks, as all our partnered investment product providers integrate sustainability into their investment processes and consider the adverse impacts of their investments on sustainability factors.

We take due care so that our internal remuneration policy with respect to investment or insurance advice on insurance-based investment products (‘IBIPs’) promotes sound and effective risk management in relation to sustainability risks and does not encourage excessive risk-taking in this regard.

When assessing products, we will consider the different approach taken by product providers in terms of them integrating sustainability risks into their product offering. This will form part of our analysis for choosing a product provider.

Life Assurance/Investments/Pension Products

For insurer protection and investment products, the commission is divided into initial commission and renewal commission (related to premium), fund-based, or trail commission (relating to accumulated fund).

Trail commission, bullet commission, fund-based, flat commission, or renewal commission are all terms used for ongoing payments. Where an investment fund is being built up through an insurance-based investment product or a pension product, the increments may be based on a percentage of the value of the fund or the annual premium. For a single premium/lump sum product the increment is generally based on the value of the fund.

Life Assurance products fall into either individual or group protection policies and Investment/Pension products would be either single or regular contribution policies. Examples of products include Life Protection, Regular Premium Life Assurance Investments, Single Premium (lump sum) Insurance-based Investments, and Single Premium Pensions.

Investments

Investment firms, which fall within the scope of the European Communities (Markets in Financial Instruments) Regulations 2007 (the MiFID Regulations), offer both standard commission and commission models involving initial and trail commission. Increments may be based on a percentage of the investment management fees, or on the value of the fund.

Mortgage Protection Quotations

All discounted mortgage protection premiums quoted, are subject to health underwriting, and may be subject to change due to the occurrence of a birthday between quote date and policy release date.

However, the discounted premium quoted will stand, where there are no chronic underlying health issues.

Commission Claw-back

Claw-back is an obligation on the intermediary to repay unearned commissions. A commission can be paid directly after a contract is concluded but is not deemed to be ‘earned’ until after a specified period of time. If the consumer cancels or withdraws from the financial product within the specified time, the intermediary must return the commission to the product producer. Please see Our Fess section below for further detail.