Quality of staff – investment and Existing business rank highest in importance
Advisers ranked Quality of staff – investment and Existing business jointly first in importance, followed by New business.
Defaqto undertakes an annual satisfaction survey among financial advisers to establish the service levels of providers of wealth and protection products. This paper sets out the results for the discretionary fund management (DFM) market in 2026.
The findings are based on adviser feedback and form the basis of the Defaqto Service Ratings awarded from 1 February 2026, providing a structured, adviser-led benchmark of service standards across DFM providers.
Satisfaction levels range from 81% to 90% across disciplines
Quality of staff – investment and Existing business recorded the highest satisfaction at 90%, while Online facilities and Quality of literature recorded 81%.
Performance varies across service and accessibility measures
Highest scoring providers differ across administration, accessibility, reporting, online facilities and literature when results are weighted by adviser-ranked importance.
Timeline ranked first overall for DFM service in 2026
Based on total above average scores weighted by the importance attributed to each service discipline.
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The analysis assessed performance across eight key DFM service disciplines, combining satisfaction scoring with adviser-ranked importance to determine overall Service Ratings.
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Advisers were asked to nominate providers they had placed business with in the previous 12 months and to rank them in order of preference where more than one provider was selected.
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Satisfaction was scored using a 1 to 5 scale, where 5 represents very satisfied and 1 represents very dissatisfied.
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Defaqto calculates a satisfaction index for each provider by assessing the proportion of above average scores and weighting the result according to the importance advisers assign to each discipline. The Service Rating is based on these indexes, with 70% of the average importance ordinarily being the Gold benchmark.
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When weighted by importance, highest scoring providers differ by discipline. Timeline achieved the highest weighted score across multiple service areas including Existing business, Online facilities, Quality of staff – administration, Quality of staff – investment, New business and Reporting.
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Based on total above average scores across all service disciplines, Timeline ranked first overall for DFM service in 2026.
Read the full report