What should you ask a financial adviser?

A good first conversation is not about trying to sound financially sophisticated. It is about understanding what the adviser can do, how they are regulated, what you will pay, what happens after the recommendation and whether the relationship feels right for you.

Are you authorised and what permissions do you have?

Financial advice in the UK is regulated. Check the adviser or firm on the Financial Services Register and make sure the permissions match the type of advice you need. Do not rely only on a logo or a statement on a website.

Ask who is responsible for the advice, which legal entity you will become a client of and how to verify that firm independently. If anything about the identity of the firm or contact details does not match the Register, stop and check before proceeding.

Are you independent or restricted?

An independent adviser must consider a sufficiently diverse range of relevant products and providers when making a personal recommendation. A restricted adviser may advise on a narrower range, particular products or products from selected providers. Restricted does not automatically mean poor, and independent does not automatically mean right for you.

The useful question is what the restriction means in practice. Ask which markets, products or providers the adviser can and cannot consider for the specific work you need.

What will the advice cost in pounds, not just percentages?

Ask for charges in clear cash terms as well as percentages. Advice may involve an initial planning fee, an implementation charge, an ongoing percentage of assets, a fixed ongoing fee or a combination. Product, platform and fund costs can sit alongside adviser charges.

Request an illustration of the total first-year cost and an estimate of the ongoing annual cost at your current portfolio value. If the fee is percentage-based, ask how the pounds amount changes as your assets rise or fall.

What exactly is included in the service?

A financial plan, product recommendation, pension transfer analysis, investment implementation and ongoing review are different services. Ask what deliverables you will receive, which areas are in scope and which are not.

For ongoing advice, ask how often you will meet, what gets reviewed, whether cashflow planning is updated, who you contact between reviews and what happens if your circumstances change suddenly.

Who will I actually deal with?

Some firms have one adviser who manages the relationship from start to finish; others use teams of planners, paraplanners and administrators. Neither model is inherently better, but you should know who your main contact will be and what happens if that person leaves.

If continuity matters to you, ask how the firm handles adviser changes and whether another adviser can access your planning history without you having to start again.

How will you decide whether a recommendation is suitable?

A regulated adviser should gather enough information about your objectives, finances, knowledge, experience, capacity for loss and attitude to risk to make a suitable recommendation. Ask what information they need from you and how they deal with uncertainty or incomplete records.

A good process should make you feel understood rather than pushed toward a product. Be wary if a recommendation seems to appear before the adviser has taken time to understand your circumstances.

How do you approach investment risk?

Risk questionnaires can be useful, but your ability to tolerate market falls is only one part of the conversation. Ask how the adviser distinguishes willingness to take risk from your financial capacity to absorb losses, and how the proposed investment strategy connects to specific goals and time horizons.

If retirement is close, ask how the adviser thinks about withdrawals, cash reserves and poor market periods rather than discussing growth in isolation.

What happens if I decide not to proceed?

Before committing, understand whether you owe anything for the initial meeting, when chargeable work begins and whether you can stop the process before implementation. Ask for the terms in writing.

Adviser Finder’s own introductory service is complimentary to use and you are under no obligation to proceed with an adviser we introduce. Any advice engagement, fees and terms are between you and the regulated adviser company you choose to engage.

Questions worth taking to the first meeting

A simple list can keep the conversation focused: What are you authorised to advise on? Are you independent or restricted? What will I pay initially and each year? What do I receive for that fee? Who looks after me? How do you select investments or products? How will you measure whether my plan is on track? How easy is it to stop ongoing service? And what happens if I have a complaint?

The quality of the answers matters, but so does whether the adviser explains them in language you understand.