Financial planners have celebrated the best of their own with the Financial Planning Association's (FPA) inaugural Value of Advice Awards. Winners were announced during the group’s National Conference in Melbourne last week.

FPA Chairman Corinna Dieters, who presented the awards, said there was strong competition in each of the four categories – which should set an excellent benchmark for next year’s awards.

National winners were Phillipa Elliot of Epic Adviser Solutions (wealth management); Ben Hatcher of Hillross Financial Services (post-retirement planning and management); Neil Kendall of Charter Financial Planning (low-income planning); and Rod Scurrah of Garvan Financial Planning (pre-retirement planning).

Entries for next year’s awards are open from March 2007. The winners will be announced in September.