fiancial adviser

My husband used to be an Independent Financial Adviser [IFA]. He NEVER had to advertise as it was all based on existing clients' referrals. We sold the business 5 years ago and he is now retired.
Please be careful who you consult - there are an awful lot of unscrupulous advisers out there.

Do you know anyone who already uses an IFA? A personal recommendation is a good thing.

However, be wary of 'advisers' connected to your bank or similar. They only have a very limited amount of products to advise you about - those that their own financial institution provides. [eg Lloyds, Santander etc] and they will be very keen to earn commission from you!

An 'independent' adviser is just that - with access to a whole range of companies and products.

And please note that you legally should be informed of how much money any adviser will receive from selling you a product.

Good luck - please don't be taken advantage of.

Thank you Pyewacket1, I certainly will as soon as I know I am likely to need. you.

icanhandthemback

*Pyewacket1*, are you able to say where you are based? I will be looking to invest on behalf of my Mum when her house is sold and the FA I consulted about my Mum's care fees was not my cup of tea so I walked away.

I'm based in the north east (County Durham) although I have clients in other parts of England.

I'm always happy to chat, either face-to-face, on the telephone, or on Zoom and, if it's easier for anyone, recommend advisers in other parts of the country who have the same, or similar, credentials.

Please feel free to PM me and I'll give you my contact information and relevant information so you can find out more about me.

Pyewacket1, are you able to say where you are based? I will be looking to invest on behalf of my Mum when her house is sold and the FA I consulted about my Mum's care fees was not my cup of tea so I walked away.

I haven't used a financial advisor - tied or independent - for about 25 years and I manage my own money. It meant I had to do some reading but I'm happy with that. Of course I've made the occasional mistake but no FA is going to get it right all of the time in my opinion.

Pyewacket1

Callistemon21

An IFA will continue to take commission for ever.

Unless you have policies pre-dating 2012 then they don’t take commissions.

If you’re paying ongoing advice fees you should be having at least annual reviews.

If you’re not having the reviews, switch off the fees.

A good, reputable adviser won’t allow you to pay ongoing fees if they’re not seeing you;

I have switched off the fees for clients who can’t find the time to see me because I don’t want to be paid for a service I’m not delivering!.

These were pre-2012
When the IFA gave up his business another IFA took them over and took the % monthly commission - but we were never told.
We only found out when we claimed for misselling of mortgage endowment policies.

Buyer beware and that includes IFAs, many good and a few very bad apples

It is good that fees were introduced in 2012, rather than commission. We actually got rid or our IFA in 2006

Callistemon21

An IFA will continue to take commission for ever.

Unless you have policies pre-dating 2012 then they don’t take commissions.

If you’re paying ongoing advice fees you should be having at least annual reviews.

If you’re not having the reviews, switch off the fees.

A good, reputable adviser won’t allow you to pay ongoing fees if they’re not seeing you;

I have switched off the fees for clients who can’t find the time to see me because I don’t want to be paid for a service I’m not delivering!.

karmalady

To stop the trail commission,you have to make a complete break with the IFA and cancel every invstment ever made by that IFA, As long as you have the investment then the IFA will get that trail and it could be whole of life

Apologies for contradicting you but this is wrong for the vast majority of cases.

You can simply switch off the fees which are separate, unless it’s a St James’s Place product, in which case there’s a form you can complete to sever the relationship with the adviser and switch off the ongoing fees.

The only products which have ongoing trail commissions are those which predate the retail distribution review date of 31/12/2012 as everything implemented since then has been fees, rather than commission, based.

If you need help with this I can tell you how to do it without having to surrender or encase all products and, potentially, lose money or create a tax problem.

I want to caveat this by explaining I’m an IFA, with my own practice, and have never had a complaint from a client despite being in financial services for over 35 years. I’m affiliated with the Law Society and an associate member of SOLLA (Society of Later Life Advisers) and qualified to Chartered level in Later Life Planning.

Until, and unless, we have agreed a fee, all meetings with a client are on my time and do not carry a cost. I spend time educating a client on risk, volatility and capacity for loss and, together, we agree the most appropriate investment strategy going forward.

If it’s something a client is confident doing without help, then I’ll leave them to their own devices, however, if they want to utilise my knowledge and experience, and have ongoing investment advice, then I charge fees which are agreed upfront in writing.

Most financial advisers are not independent and are either tied or restricted. What that means is if, for example, you go to Barclays or Santander, they’re going to sell you Barclays or Santander products. If a St. James’s Place or Wesleyan adviser comes to your home then they’ll sell you St James’s Place or Wesleyan products, in the main.

A true IFA will have access to the whole market and will be able to recommend not only the best platform (cost isn’t always the main driver but it’s certainly important), but should also be recommending a risk rated, asset allocated portfolio, which utilises the most tax efficient approach for an individual.

They don’t take commissions for this, and haven’t since the end of 2012, but should provide a clear breakdown of costs, including the platform, the fund managers, and their own initial advice fee plus any ongoing advice charges.

Ongoing adviser charges can be switched off at any time and a client has the absolute right to stop using an adviser if they feel there’s no benefit.

I could keep going and add loads of extra information but just wanted to dispel a few of the misconceptions I’ve read above.

To stop the trail commission,you have to make a complete break with the IFA and cancel every invstment ever made by that IFA, As long as you have the investment then the IFA will get that trail and it could be whole of life

Callistemon21

An IFA will continue to take commission for ever.

absolutely right. Our jailed IFA was found from an official list. He would have had thousands every year from my husbands pension pot. My cost wrt managing (and doubling) his pension pot was just £150 a year plus minimal trading charges

Not necessarily Callistemon - only if you keep "re-employing" them year after year.

We had one when we had a complex situation. It was a one-off and we agreed we would contact him again if we wanted further advice.

We paid him once for all the initial work and then had a review meeting once everything was in place to see if we wanted to keep him on. We decided no.
Subsequently we haven't needed him.
There are obviously different ways of employing someone to advise you.

I liked him and feel he found what was right for us in spite of us being a bit odd!
I would go back to him if something complex should come up again.

An IFA will continue to take commission for ever.

The very last person I would use is a banks IFA choose your own, they will skin you.
No problem with laundering its coming from and going to verified places. First task collect everything together, if there are shares involved you might want to keep them.
Lastly no rush, probate may take 2 yrs easily.

As I recall BusyBee6969 has about £90K to invest so too much for an ISA. An IFA will be able to advise on best investment for her personal circumstance and minimise any tax due and whether a stocks and shares ISA is better than a cash ISA.

For most of us who don’t want to take a risk with investments an ISA with a reputable company is going to be suitable and you don’t need an IFA to tell you that.

I am really glad to hear that, busybee6969.

met a lady who is very well off near where i walk my dog know her years asked her if she knew any FA, she said had used same man for 20 years highly good at his job ,got his details , going to get in touch with him,thank you everyone,

We used one from my OH’s bank who was useless, the only good thing was that we didn’t lose money. We went to an IFA recommended by a friend and he has proved to be excellent and has nearly doubled our original investment even though we have taken money out over the years. Ask around your friends for a recommendation and/or warning.

I worked in a bank for many years and left partly because of the pressure put on staff to make appointments for customers with the financial advisor. The idea was for the advisor to make as much commission as possible.

Busybee, you have made the correct decision to not go back.

My dh is a stockbroker/ financial adviser and he refers to the banks as bucket shops. Make sure they are on the Financial Advisors Register.

If you are not happy, walk away. If it is a financial adviser for a Bank they are trying to upsell every step of the way. Rather sadly that seems to be how the banks make such vast profits.
I would ask on Social Media, like NextDoor (without giving away too much information of amounts) for people's recommendations for a non-push financial adviser. You'll soon see who is popular.

That sounds horrendous busybee. Our IFA was recommended by our business accountant and is very good.
We don't take on board all of his suggestions but those we have, have worked well for us.

Any decisions need to be thought through, you shouldn't be rushed and any decent IFA will know this, as well as respecting a risk level that you're comfortable with.

just to add, that at the end of year one, he suggested investing in various hedge funds. That immediately set alarm bells ringing