Connect and Collect
In our initial consultation, we have the chance to meet with each other. Here, we will introduce our services and how we can help you, and you will have the opportunity to ask any questions that you may have.
With your consent, we will discuss your goals and objectives, and gain an understanding of what area of your finances that you seek financial advice in. We will also gather information that is relevant to your situation, including your current income, expenses, values of assets, and details of any debts that you may have in place. It will also be important for us to gain specific information for any existing superannuation, investments, or life insurance policies that you have in place. Getting this information is an essential part of delivering high quality advice.
Throughout this initial meeting we will also provide you with education on the most relevant subject areas for you. Some examples include:
- Understanding how superannuation works and how it can be used in retirement;
- How to best utilise your surplus savings to build wealth for your future;
- How much life insurance is right for you, to help protect both you and your family, and how to pay for it;
- What Centrelink entitlements are you eligible for;
- How to ensure your estate planning matters are in order.
We also discuss the concept of investment risk, and what level of investment risk is right for you. A lot of people assume that to invest you have to take high risks, however this is incorrect. The most important thing is that we understand the level of investment risk that you are comfortable with, and we then adopt investment management strategies in line with the level of investment risk that is right for you.
Analyse
Once we have an understanding of you and your specific details, we can then evaluate the information that you have provided us. We do this by completing relevant research and the consideration of various product options for you. This includes the comparison of product providers based on various features that are appropriate for your needs and preferences, as well as the relevant fees and charges that apply with such products.
We will consider what strategy will best achieve your goals and construct our recommendations to you.
These recommendations will be included in your own personalised ‘Statement of Advice’.
Advise
We will meet to present your financial plan (Statement of Advice) to you. Your ‘Statement of Advice’ will generally be sent to you prior to this meeting, to give you the opportunity to have an initial read through the contents and formulate any questions that you may have.
When we meet, we will discuss how our recommendations can help achieve your goals. This is a great opportunity for us to provide you with additional education or clarification on areas that you may not entirely understand.
At the end of this meeting, you will be in a much better position to understand how the recommendations can improve your situation so that you can then decide on what next steps you would like to undertake.
Implement
Once you understand the recommendations contained in the ‘Statement of Advice’, and you are comfortable with proceeding further, we then move towards implementing the recommendations. You will typically provide us with your ‘agreement to proceed/implement’. Depending on the advice being provided, it is likely that you will need to complete and sign some additional forms which we will guide you through.
We will then complete the implementation process for you, and will keep you updated throughout, so you don’t have to worry about the paperwork process.
Reconnect / Ongoing Review
At implementation, together we will determine how regularly you would like to meet for your future reviews. Ongoing reviews are important given that changes can occur, such as the following:
- Changes to your situation and/or circumstances
- Changes to markets and products
- Changes to legislation
At your ongoing review meetings, we can discuss any such changes, as well as reviewing your goals and objectives, and assessing as to how your current financial planning strategies are meeting such goals.
From time to time, we will need to make some adjustments to your strategies, and this ongoing review meeting is a great time to discuss such changes.
