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In 2003, Pershing introduced Subscribe®, an easier way for firms and advisors to manage their annuity business. Subscribe streamlines how advisors process, service and maintain fixed, variable and indexed annuities — helping enhance the overall experience of clients and capture a greater share of this growing market. Subscribe’s technol-ogy platform enables advisors to electronically submit an-nuity transactions and interface with many of the country’s leading insurance companies.

In this interview, Hans Schemmel, director, individual retirement products and annuities at Pershing LLC, a BNY Mellon company, describes upcoming enhancements to Sub-scribe, including streamlined order-entry and administrative screens that improve advisor efficiency, make the most of their time and make the process even more user friendly. En-hancements also include aesthetic improvements to the look

and feel of the system plus plans for life order entry and con-solidation, for an even higher-quality experience for firms and advisors.

What is Subscribe?Subscribe is Pershing’s annuity and life insurance solution, which consists of many components. First, available through NetX360®, our advisor-facing platform, Subscribe allows advi-sors to electronically submit annuity transactions with many of the country’s leading insurance companies. Second, Sub-scribe allows networking of contracts to brokerage accounts, which gives advisors and their clients a more complete pic-ture of their portfolio. And finally, there is our Annuity Ana-lytics Dashboard as well as our approval and oversight tools, which help broker-dealers manage their annuity business.

How can Subscribe play a role in helping with a firm’s compliance efforts for annuity business?This is one of the main benefits of Subscribe. First, we have our Enterprise Rules Engine™, which facilitates license and appointment checks and allows firms to set certain thresholds, such as liquid net worth for purchases. Also, our online order-entry system has the ability to integrate firms’ suitability questionnaires into the wizard, and at the end of the order, it automatically routes the order for home office approval. Another great feature is the reporting, which is available through either Pershing’s Report Center or Annuities Analytics Dashboard — providing reporting for transactions, activity and positions. All of this is avail-able through a consistent advisor order-entry process.

How does Subscribe help an individual advisor? Great question. With this single order-entry system, Subscribe can offer tremendous benefits to advisors by lowering not-in-good-order (NIGO) rates, completing updated broker-dealer paperwork and requiring less time to navigate various carrier differences. It’s really a timesaver for advisors, and, in fact, they potentially can get paid faster too.

Pershing Enhances Subscribe® Annuity Platform for Even Easier and More Efficient Annuity Business Management

Hans Schemmel - Director, Individual Retirement Products and Annuities

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Despite the delay in the DOL conflict of interest rule, do you think the fiduciary mindset is here to stay?Yes. And it’s not just me. We hear it from our clients too. Many of them want to take the appropriate steps to this fiduciary mindset, regardless of the fate of the rule. With Pershing’s DOL rule solutions and other various solutions, our clients may get more from our Subscribe compliance capabilities during the order-entry process and post-trade compliance than with direct-to-carrier business as it’s done today.

Earlier, you mentioned Subscribe’s Annuity Ana-lytics Dashboard. Would you mind telling us more about it?Absolutely. We worked closely with our affiliate, Albridge An-alytics, to develop the Annuity Analytics Dashboard, which provides firms with an enterprisewide view of their annuity and life insurance business. The dashboard is an integrated and efficient solution for managing annuity sales flows, and it offers more transparency of new and existing business for improved oversight, compliance and regulatory review.

Via the dashboard, firms can review their annuity busi-ness — both networked and non-networked — through three distinct modules: the Positions module, Order module and Financial Activity Reporting (FAR) module. I’d like to point out that this is contingent on data provided to the DTCC.

The Positions module allows firms to search existing an-nuity position by carrier, plan type, issue and surrender date, or advisor. In addition, firms can review positions that are networked to a brokerage account and those that are not net-worked to a brokerage account, also called non-networked.

With the Order module, firms can review the data asso-ciated with new and subsequent transactions. This informa-tion may also include 1035 exchanges and qualified transfers, product types, issuing carrier, state of solicitation, qualified versus nonqualified details, and other advisor information.

And finally there’s the FAR module, which provides a holis-tic summary of insurance carrier transactional information, including contributions, withdrawals, money in motion (con-tract and subaccount changes) and systematic changes.

You mention networked and non-networked posi-tions. What are they, and what’s the difference?If a client has a Pershing brokerage account, an annuity posi-tion can be linked, or “networked,” to this account, providing greater transparency or a more holistic view of the client’s as-sets. Non-networked policies are those that are not tied to a Pershing brokerage account. So information like contract val-ues and premiums will not display in the brokerage window. We constantly work with our clients to efficiently assist with

networking existing contracts to a Pershing account to show those contract details.

How does Subscribe eliminate paperwork for firms and advisors?There are a few ways in which Subscribe helps eliminate pa-perwork. For example, the electronic order entry allows pa-perwork to be uploaded and attached and submitted electron-ically to the carriers. This feature helps significantly reduce applications that are submitted NIGO. Our efforts to eliminate paperwork are specific not only to advisors and firms but also to investors, as we allow for e-delivery of statements.

What’s new in Subscribe, and what were Pershing’s goals for these changes?Well, for starters, we are always considering and looking to add additional carriers. We currently have 50+ carriers available. In 2018, we are introducing a new and improved order-entry platform — improving the look and feel as well as navigation through the online order-entry process. For example, screens and tasks that are currently spread over multiple screens will be consolidated into fewer screens, and the same can be said for the administrative screens. We are constantly looking at ways to improve and build on the platform — making the platform more user friendly and efficient with the goal of improving the way firms and advisors manage their annuity business.

In addition to its annuity features, how does Sub-scribe also support advisors with life order entry and life consolidation?Ah, good question. We spoke a little bit about our network-ing capabilities with annuities, but this same networking ca-pability is currently available for life insurance policies. We currently provide details, such as the contract values, total premium and surrender value, as well as any owner and ben-eficiary information, in NetX360. These and other details are also available to clients using our NetXInvestor platform. In addition, this information appears on the clients’ statements.

Right now, we are working on integrating a life insurance electronic order-entry solution into our NetX360 platform. This single sign-on, wizard-based solution will streamline processing and managing life insurance applications. We hope to make formal announcements shortly.

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ABOUT US

BNY Mellon’s Pershing and its affiliates provide a comprehensive network of global financial business solutions to financial professionals, broker-dealers, family offices, hedge fund and ’40 Act fund managers, RIA firms, and wealth managers. Many of the world’s most sophisticated and successful financial services firms rely on Pershing for clearing and custody; investment, wealth, and retirement solutions; technology and enterprise data management; trading services; prime brokerage; and business consulting. Pershing LLC (member FINRA, NYSE, SIPC) is a BNY Mellon company.

CONTACT

To learn more about how Subscribe can help with your annuity business, please contact either Hans Schemmel or Lachadra Mason:

Hans Schemmel, Director Financial Solutions Phone: (617) 769-4206 Email: hans.schemmel@pershing.com

Lachadra Mason, Vice President Financial Solutions Phone: (321) 249-4747 Email: lachadra.mason@pershing.com

©2018 Pershing LLC. Pershing LLC, member FINRA, NYSE, SIPC, is a wholly owned subsidiary of The Bank of New York Mellon Corporation (BNY Mellon). Trademark(s) belong to their respective owners.

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