Low-level routine work will be the first area of SMSF administration to be carried out by artificial intelligence (AI) but advisers and accountants should still concentrate on how this development can result in the improved servicing of clients, the head of a new SMSF administration firm has claimed.
SMSFAI chief executive Olivia Long said while she does not believe AI should ever replace professional advice and services it can take on the mechanical processes that are involved in SMSF administration that clients are not interested in.
“There’ll always be a need for the trusted professional but AI makes running SMSFs easier and it’s my intention it will replace the year end accountant sitting in the background reconciling data and going through a rote process,” Long told selfmanagedsuper.
“I’d say at least 90 per cent of what the accountants do is following a checklist in the reconciliation process, whether it be reconciling daily or annually and reconciling the data feed transactions or spending more time on the non-data fed information from unusual assets.”
According to Long SMSF practitioners will benefit from the adoption of AI as it should make no difference to what their clients see but can improve their own work processes.
“For clients who have a trusted professional how the work gets done in the background is of no real relevance to them, whether it be offshoring or outsourcing,” she noted.
“They just want to know they’re going to get accurate financial statements and advice on what to do with the information they have now got.
“AI will remove a lot of the administration but can also give access to live data so as practitioners head into 30 June they can ask for a list of all clients who have room in their non-concessional cap and what the balances are so they can contact them, and AI will generate a list.
“It can then create a series of personalised emails to go out to each client, advising them of their caps, what they are eligible to do and inviting them to make contact which are things that usually take weeks or teams of people to go through data manually and identify those people.
“AI will do all of the data analysis for you and not just come up with an answer but take it to the next step and create a call to action.
“I’m hoping less of that grunt work being done by the professionals will enable them to have more time to service more clients because there’s not enough financial advisers out there to service SMSFs, let alone those people that have superannuation and other vehicles that are also seeking advice.”
