Aviva’s adviser platform saw record sales for the first half of the year with net flows up 48% to £2.7bn.

Assets under management rose 29% to £37bn, according to the provider’s financial results for the first half of the year.

Whilst a great improvement on the platform’s more recent results, the net inflows still fall short of the £6.2bn reported in 2017 before re-platforming caused ongoing issues for Financial Planners using the platform. Aviva moved clients to a new FNZ-backed platform in January 2018 but the project was beset with problems with Financial Planners still unable to carry out some tasks in March.

Aviva Investors also had a good start to the year with revenue growing 7%. Net flows for the investment business improved to £829m, in comparison to outflows of £574m in the first half of 2020.

Aviva Investors operating profit more than doubled to £19m (HY2020: £9m) driven largely by higher origination fees on real assets and the impact on asset levels of positive market movements. Cost containment measures and streamlining of the business resulted in a reduction in controllable costs, excluding cost reduction implementation costs, to £168m (HY2020: £171m) with further benefits expected in the future.

The insurance, life and pensions firm said it has had its best half year sales in a decade for general insurance. The firm also shared its has had record flows into its savings and retirement products.

Overall the firm made a loss of £198m in comparison to a profit of £874m in the first half of 2020. The firm attributed the loss to one-off costs from selling its French business.

Aviva added that it would return £4bn to shareholders by next June, following the sale of eight of its businesses. This will include a £750m share buyback.

Amanda Blanc, chief executive at Aviva, said: "We delivered some of our best ever sales figures in the first six months. In UK general insurance we delivered our highest sales in a decade. In savings and retirement, net flows increased by 24% to a record £5.2bn, and we have added 100,000 new workplace customers, reinforcing our number one position.

"Alongside delivering growth, we continue to focus on reducing controllable costs, which are down 2%. We are on track to deliver our £300m savings target in 2022 and are focused on achieving top quartile efficiency in all our businesses.

"While we have got more to do, our half year results show we have what it takes to drive growth in our businesses. We remain completely focused on transforming performance, capitalising on the breadth of Aviva, making insurance simple and easy for our customers, and creating value for our shareholders."