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Despite decades of efforts to address financial gender inequality in Australia and New Zealand, women continue to face significant financial disadvantages compared with men. These disparities compound over a lifetime and often culminate in economic insecurity during retirement.

So, what are some of the key financial challenges that women face and can accountants do a better job of taking care of their female clients?

Jacqui Clarke FCA, a Sydney-based chartered accountant with 30 years’ experience in the profession – including 25 years at Deloitte and PwC – has advised some of Australia’s wealthiest families and serves on multiple boards. Now a director of a practice, she has written an award-winning book, Stop Worrying About Money: Start Planning Now to Secure Your Financial Future (available at the CA Library), which offers practical strategies to help people understand their financial position and overcome common obstacles.

Her insights highlight how chartered accountants can empower women by improving their financial literacy, encouraging active involvement in financial decisions, and helping them set and achieve long-term financial goals.

A 2025 report from Frontier Economics – Making Cents of It: The Benefits of Improving the Financial Literacy of Australian Children – reveals that 37% of adult men and 52% of adult women don’t understand basic financial concepts.

Women’s lack of financial knowledge is a crucial problem that needs to be addressed says Clarke, who references a Household, Income and Labour Dynamics in Australia (HILDA) survey.

“There is a significant difference between men and women, and when you get to the younger cohort, 85% of young women don’t understand financial concepts and 72% of young men don’t, so the situation is actually getting worse.”

Similarly, 2022 research carried out by Massey University’s Financial Education and Research Centre in New Zealand showed that only 29% of females reported their financial literacy as ‘very good’ or ‘excellent’, compared with 44% of males.

Delegating financial management

Clarke says even women who are the breadwinners in a household often think everything is OK because the money is coming in, “but there’s often a lack of consideration for the longer-term view such as superannuation or planning for unexpected events, such as illness or divorce.

“A lot of women delegate financial management to their spouse, particularly when they are raising children, running a household and working a full-time job. Women are just so busy.”

On both sides of the Tasman, numerous studies show women continue to perform a disproportionate share of housework and caregiving responsibilities.

“As a result, if there’s someone else in the household who’s willing to manage the money and they’ve just got so much to do, women are much more likely to delegate their financial responsibility,” says Clarke. “Some women can have avoidant behaviour around knowing what’s really going on financially. Are they setting financial goals and planning for the future? Not necessarily.”

Financial safety

Clarke says a lack of financial knowledge also leaves women vulnerable to financial infidelity, where partners hide, spend or secretly mismanage money within a relationship.

“At the worst end of the spectrum, of course, is financial abuse but financial infidelity is very common and I see it a lot, particularly when people are going through a divorce,” Clarke says. “Financial infidelity is easy to do with women because they tend to be preoccupied with so many other things.”

She urges CAs to encourage female clients to check their credit cards and accounts, and to stress the importance of knowing what’s going on financially.

“I believe we accountants have a responsibility to ensure that spouses are attending meetings around their tax returns, annual compliance, assets and who owns what.”

Present and informed

Clarke says that in a traditional relationship, if someone is delegated with the financial management of the household, that person tends to be the one that has the relationship with the accountant.

“I believe we accountants have a responsibility to ensure that spouses are attending meetings around their tax returns, annual compliance, assets and who owns what,” she says. “Throughout my career, I’d say probably nine times out of 10 my lead client has been a man.”

Accountants also need to think about how they will make women feel secure, and know the risks and the opportunities in their financial situation.

“They must see both parties, not just the man. Don’t let women not come to the meeting,” Clarke urges. “It astounds me how often women just don’t show up. They’ll electronically sign tax returns or documents, but do they know what they’re signing? Make sure you ask.

“I recently had a client, for example, putting a mortgage on a A$20 million home and the wife owned the house. I asked him, ‘Does your wife understand this? She needs to have independent legal advice with respect to this transaction’. But this kind of thing goes on all the time.”

Building a financial village

Clarke says that, in some instances, she might recommend women get their own accountant.

“We don’t lodge tax information jointly in Australia or in New Zealand, so there’s no problem if a woman has an independent adviser.”

She says it comes down to women recognising they can ask questions and that their accountant is approachable.

“It’s about acknowledging their situation, and showing how you can support and help them. It’s important to have conversations about their financial situation. I do scenario analysis with women to show them how the changes they make today can have an impact on their future. Ask them what retiring looks like to them, try to encourage a little bit of forward thinking.”

Additionally, as Clarke outlines in her book, she proposes both women and men have a “financial village” around them.

“Ask your female client, ‘If I’m your chartered accountant, who else are you talking to?’. Because, lo and behold, you’ll find again that the spouse has got the lawyer or insurance broker, but the women do not. Introduce them to advisers and encourage them to widen their advisory circle.”

Says Clarke: “In the long run, it’s about education and transparency, breaking down the walls of the old boys club, the ‘friend of a friend’ who went to the same school, the networks women are not part of. And, as accountants, we have strong networks. Ask yourself, how can you elevate the women in your network? CAs are hosting functions all the time, how can you bring women into that?”

Seismic money shift

At the moment there is a great wealth transfer under way. An estimated NZ$1 trillion in New Zealand and A$5 trillion in Australia is set to pass from baby boomers to younger generations – and 65% of it is going to women.

Clarke says CAs must be prepared to support this growing demographic with tailored financial advice, planning and education to ensure long-term financial security.

“I think it’s inherently burdened with risk. The boomers mostly have a great network of financial advisers around them, but the gen Xs and the millennials don’t have the same developed network.

“The conversations I want accountants to be having with women is recognising what’s on their balance sheet and who holds assets, things like that. The challenge is that when the time comes, they are unskilled, haven’t worked out how to navigate advisers and don’t have people around them they can trust.”

Clarke says that even though she sees clients for quarterly appointments, “Interestingly, it’s often still focused on the generation who’s making the money, not the next generation whose hands the wealth will land in. It’s as if it’s not of interest to them yet because they’re not making those decisions.”

Women’s business

Felicity Hill FCA is a director at Cahill Accounting in Auckland and a successful accountant, business adviser, international speaker and panellist. She says some accountants see female-owned businesses as hobby businesses, “where, in fact, a lot of my female clients are my more successful and wealthy clients”.

“Our practice seems to have developed quite a niche in terms of looking after female business owners and that’s not because they haven’t had accountants, they just haven’t had an accountant who has taken them or their business seriously.”

She receives reports from women business clients that accountants mansplain to them. “I think that’s probably one of the larger challenges.”

Hill finds there are many business owners, both male and female, who don’t have sufficient financial literacy.  She says in terms of life stages where women might be more financially vulnerable, such as when taking a career break to have children or retiring, she likes to front-foot that conversation and plan ahead.

“I think as accountants we have a responsibility to ensure there’s an awareness of how these things are going to impact them.”

Hill points out that she does not see a prevalence of women in business not attending meetings with their partners. “But when that is the case, we have a responsibility to ensure that we bring the female into the conversation so they’re aware – particularly in this economic environment, where there are businesses battling with solvency. If a wife is a director, she needs to be in that meeting.”

While communication is key to any business relationship, Hill says women tend to lead a business with both their head and their heart, “whereas men, as a generalisation, are probably a little bit more pragmatic”.

In this case, connection and empathy are vital. “Advisers need to understand that that’s an angle that some women may be coming from and ensure that the advice aligns to that.”

Hill says the great wealth transfer creates a different market for CAs, “ensuring women are supported and that they’ve got good people around them, good financial advisers, accountants and bankers, and that they are the right fit”.

“It used to be that accountants would take on any client with a pulse. But there is an ideal client for each firm and if the accountant doesn’t fit with the client, it can turn into a problem later.”

R.E.S.P.E.C.T

Hill acknowledges that decades ago women in the profession – both clients and accountants – were not well represented, but things have shifted.

“Women don’t need to be treated with kid gloves. They don’t necessarily need a different approach. They simply want to be treated with respect and taken seriously, and I think the next generation that’s coming through has that in check.”

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Take aways

The CA Library has more interesting reads on the subject. Go to: Women and Wealth: A Playbook to Empower Clients and Unlock Their Fortune by Cary Carbonaro and Stop Worrying About Money: Start Planning Now to Secure Your Financial Future by Jacqui Clarke FCA.