AustralianSuper plans staged online advice; separately, regulators scrutinise AI. Where can AI help advisers without missing rollover risks?
AI and superannuation advice keep appearing in the same conversation. In August, AustralianSuper announced a staged online advice service covering investment options, contributions and retirement health checks. Members whose needs fit the online journey will be able to receive personalised recommendations. Some can speak with an adviser, with complex cases referred for broader advice.
In April, APRA warned superannuation trustees about AI risk. It would be easy to roll those stories together and say generative AI is now giving members super advice. AustralianSuper's announcement does not identify generative AI as the source of those recommendations. Digital advice and generative AI are different things.
For advice firms, the question is where AI can help without losing the details that determine whether a super recommendation is right.
ASIC calls digital advice the provision of automated financial product advice through algorithms, without a human adviser directly involved. Its digital advice guide, RG 255, deals with the licensing and advice obligations that follow. That definition does not mean every digital advice service uses a generative AI model.
An AI assistant used by an adviser has a different job. It might organise a fact find, draw attention to a missing document or draft an explanation for the adviser to check. In that workflow, the adviser still decides what to recommend and remains responsible for the advice. An AI writing tool does not itself give automated advice to the member. But putting a chatbot in front of a member raises a different question: is its answer factual information, general advice or personal advice? ASIC's RG 244 explains the distinction. If a chatbot gives financial product advice without a human adviser involved, ASIC's guidance on digital advice also matters.
Say a client wants to move from one super fund to another. A tool can help assemble the balances, fees and investment options for review. The adviser also needs to know what happens to existing insurance and whether the new arrangement fits the client's circumstances.
This is not hypothetical. In its September 2026 financial advice update, ASIC describes a case where an adviser failed to identify death and total and permanent disability cover held in two clients' existing funds. The clients lost that cover after following the rollover recommendations. The error went undetected through two later Records of Advice.
ASIC's super switching guidance asks advisers to find out about insurance needs, existing investments, tax and the client's other relevant circumstances. It also says the advice document must explain the costs, benefits and significant consequences of a switch. If insurance will be lost, a vague warning is not enough: explain the cover and the level of cover the client stands to lose.
That gives an AI workflow a sensible boundary. Use it to surface a missing insurance schedule or an unanswered question about cover. Do not treat its neat comparison as proof that a rollover is suitable. If the source record is incomplete, the draft is incomplete too.
An advice firm can test a proposed workflow on a small set of representative, de-identified tasks. Before putting client information into a tool, check:
That first question matters to trustees as well as advice firms. APRA's April letter to regulated entities says boards need to oversee AI strategy and third-party dependencies. ASIC and APRA's super CEO roundtables put frontier AI, cyber and operational resilience on the agenda. A faster draft is no substitute for those controls.
Our guide to AI governance in financial advice looks at how firms can put these checks into their everyday workflow.
AustralianSuper's August announcement does not say so. It describes online advice journeys and options to speak with an adviser, without identifying generative AI as the technology behind the recommendations.
Check the client's circumstances, the current and proposed fund, fees, tax and any insurance that could be lost. ASIC's super switching guidance says the advice must explain the costs, benefits and significant consequences for that client. An AI-drafted comparison still needs to be checked against the source records.
For an advice firm, the opportunity is to spend less time gathering and formatting the file, and more time checking the parts that could change the client's outcome. If you want to see how AdviseWell supports adviser-led workflows, talk to us.
