Access Financial Services has announced a new partnership with Matt Chapman, widely known across the industry as The Protection Coach, as part of a broader push to strengthen adviser development and customer outcomes.
Chapman, a former adviser turned trainer, is recognised for encouraging advisers to focus on clients’ long-term goals and personal circumstances rather than transactional sales. His approach centres on improving confidence, clarity and consistency in protection conversations.
The programme will support Access FS’s network of more than 280 mortgage and protection advisers, who collectively serve over 20,000 customers. Over the next nine months, Chapman will work with the firm’s managers and mentors, equipping them with coaching techniques to be rolled out more widely across the business.
The initiative is intended to help advisers move away from product-led discussions and towards conversations that explore clients’ financial vulnerabilities, life plans and longer-term objectives.
Karl Wilkinson (pictured), chief executive and founder of Access FS, said: “Partnering with The Protection Coach is a game changer. Matt is at the top of his game and is set to help our advisers have goals-based conversations – rather than just selling. His approach fits perfectly with our mission to support advisers in delivering positive customer outcomes.”
Access FS said the partnership forms part of its ongoing investment in adviser training and development, as well as its wider ambition to improve standards across the mortgage and protection market.
The programme will begin this spring and run through to the end of the year.
The announcement comes during a period of expansion for the business. Access FS has significantly increased adviser numbers in recent years through its academy programme and has set out plans to grow to 1,000 advisers within the next three years.
The firm has also reported strong financial performance, with its mortgage division recording 38% revenue growth in 2025 and advisers completing 23% more loans compared with the previous year.
