Our service level and fee structure.

When you compare the charges from different financial advice firms, it’s important that you’re comparing like with like.

Typically delivered face-to-face, we provide independent financial advice. This means that our advice is completely unbiased and that we can recommend all retail investment products from across the market, depending on which are the most suitable for you.

There can be a huge difference in the advice and service offered by different financial advice firms, so it’s important that you determine the right mix of charges and service to meet your needs.

There are three key things that will help you determine whether you are getting good value:

• How much you are paying
• How you are paying it
• What level of service you are getting in return.

To help you to understand this, we offer an initial consultation without charge or obligation to get to know you and your needs better. We also explain our services, our fee structure and your payment options, and answer any questions you may have.

At your first meeting, you will be presented with a Client Agreement which specifically sets out the service to be provided and the associated fees. At this stage you can decide whether you wish to use our services.

If you decide not to use our service at this point, then no fees will be charged.

Only following your signed approval will we begin to carry out our service.

To ensure that we are fully transparent, our fees are reiterated again in your financial report.

There are three main ways to pay for our financial advice. The right approach for you will be determined by your preference and your circumstances.

1. Percentage fee

We will charge you fees based on the value of investment and pension assets that we advise you on. The maximum fee that we levy for financial advice is an initial fee of 1%, subject to a minimum charge of £100 and an ongoing annual advice fee of 0.75%.

For example, if we are advising you on investments and pensions worth £100,000, we may charge you an initial fee of up to £1,000 and ongoing fees of £750 per year.

2. Hourly rate

In some circumstances, it may be more appropriate to charge based on the time taken to provide you with financial advice, rather than a percentage of your total investment. The standard hourly rate for our independent financial advisers is £250 per hour and it is £90 per hour for our administrative staff.

If you require specialist financial advice, such as on complex pensions, estate planning, long term care or equity release, the hourly fee for our technical experts is £250 per hour.

For example, we anticipate a Defined Contribution Pension Switch (Transfer) would take 4 hours of Administrator’s time, 8 hours of a Paraplanner’s time and 10 Hours of a Senior Financial Planner’s time, giving a total fee of £4,060.

3. Fixed fee

In some cases, you may be able to agree a fixed fee for advice. This would be agreed with you at outset. This fee is based on our estimate of how many hours it will take to provide the advice. You will not pay any extra if it takes longer than anticipated, as long as the scope of the advice remains the same.

For example, a non-complex report which could typically be a review of 3 mainstream investments such as ISAs or Investment Bonds, the cost would be a minimum of £1,500.

You can pay your advice fees either by cheque, bank transfer or a deduction from your investment(s).

You can also pay the ongoing annual advice fee by direct debit.

Your adviser will discuss the most appropriate method with you.

• Professional, independent and personalised financial advice
• Detailed situational assessment to inform your planning decisions
• All necessary communications with you, your product providers and your personal representatives as required
• Comprehensive written financial planning report
• Implementation of recommended strategies

• Comprehensive regular reviews by your adviser, plus a full written report
• Proactive monitoring of your investments, pensions and other financial products
• Access to your adviser and support team by phone, email or face-to-face
• Regular financial commentary and bulletins
• Completion of all necessary administrative tasks
• A trusted independent financial adviser who is on your side

In addition to our financial advice service, we provide a discretionary investment service, which may be suitable for some of our clients. This may be appropriate for our clients who don’t want to be actively involved in the ongoing management of their portfolio and are happy to hand these over to the experts in our Investment Team.

Our investment portfolios are run to strict risk criteria, so that you know we are focussed on never taking more, or less, risk than you expect. We will also report to you regularly on your investment performance.

The charge for this service is 0.3% per annum. We are able to negotiate reduced prices for many of the underlying funds in which we invest to ensure the charges remain competitive, including the discretionary investment charges, platform charges and underlying fund charges.