It offered the incentive for sign-ups before July 12.
Rachelle Bland, of Cliffe Consulting, told the FMA she saw the offer when she signed in to her banking app.
She said it went against the FMA guidance that incentives should not be offered with a strict time limit that could distract a customer from making sound, long-term decisions about their investment.
“The focus of the advertisement was entirely on the cash being offered rather than encouraging customers to consider the overall advantages and disadvantages of transferring. I acknowledge that $100 is a small amount, but note that some months back, the ASB Bank was offering people $1000 to join their scheme (when one of my customers was re-structuring their mortgage),” she wrote.
“I would suggest that the use of the word ‘guidance’ by the FMA needs to be improved so that market participants know that these are enforceable standards that they will be measured against.”
Bland said, as an investment adviser, she believed shifting to ANZ’s KiwiSaver scheme would not be a better outcome for her own KiwiSaver.
“The fees are higher, their average annual return for the past 10 years …has significantly underperformed their market benchmark and there is a much higher level of concentration risk in the fund than I have at present.
“Retail customers would not necessarily know that reduced diversification can lead to significant differences in returns over time, but it could be seen to be safer to uninformed retail investors by having their KiwiSaver managed by NZ’s largest bank. This is where urgency becomes a significant problem and needs to be stopped.”
She said practices that encouraged rushed decisions should be stamped out.
“The FMA has the power to do this under CoFI by enforcing the Fair Conduct Principle. It would be a straightforward case for the FMA to take. I am disappointed that such behaviour seems to be allowed, tolerated or ignored by the FMA.”
ANZ said in a statement it was aware of the FMA’s guidance and took its obligations seriously.
“We are comfortable with this campaign; we do not believe the benefit distracts from making a good KiwiSaver decision. The benefit itself remains within KiwiSaver (as it is a $100 contribution to the eligible customer's KiwiSaver balance), and by the time it expires on 12 July 2026, it will have been available for a month.
“We also provide free access to advisers and have a range of digital tools and guidance to help customers make informed decisions when joining, or otherwise making decisions about their membership of, our scheme.”
ANZ said it had made meaningful changes to the diversification and resilience of its portfolios, “and that has shown up in strong performance relative to our peers - through at times highly volatile markets - over the past 12-18 months. While that is a relatively short period, that we have also strengthened our investment team and external partnerships means we are confident in the quality of our ongoing focus on delivering strong outcomes for members over time.
“We encourage any customer with a concern to follow standard practice for consumers wanting to complain about a financial provider and contact us directly in the first instance.”
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