Key Steps to Finding a Financial Advisor

Last month the Sydney Morning Herald Money section featured a good overview of the key steps to finding a financial adviser.  We thought we’d highlight the most critical steps.

Know what you need
Have a clear idea of what you want to achieve

Understand credentials

The Australian Financial Services Licence (AFSL) means the adviser operates under legislated standards.
The Financial Planning Association (FPA) and the Association of Financial Advisers (AFA) are the two main professional bodies. Both have codes of conduct and dispute resolution, which provide certainty for clients.

Check out the Financial Services Guide (FSG)

The FSG tells you a firm’s specialties and profiles individual advisers.  Read carefully as an advisor can only claim a strength here if they are genuinely qualified.

Get to know your advisor

Most advisors will give you an hour of free time at the start.  Use this time to get to know their processes, strengths and fees.

Be prepared to pay

In the old days a financial planner might have appear “free” because they were taking a commission from the products they sold.  Now planners charge a fee, expect somewhere between $800 and $3000.  Consider this an investment.

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