What to expect
Genesys and all of our wealth advisers are committed to open and honest communication at all times, as this is the foundation of good advice.
Your first appointment
The purpose of your first appointment with your wealth adviser is essentially to get to know each other. This is an opportunity to discuss the financial elements of your current lifestyle, and your concerns or future goals that have lead you to seek professional financial advice.
To establish the path that you need to follow, it's important that your adviser understands where you are now and where you want to be in the future. When undertaking this discovery process, your adviser will need various pieces of information from you. You will find listed below some of the types of information you may be asked to provide, so it's important to be prepared with as much of this information as possible.
- Income, expenses, personal assets and liabilities
- Current insurance cover (general and personal)
- Investments and superannuation
- Tax records
- Estate planning arrangements
- Attitude to risk
- Short, medium and long-term financial needs, goals and objectives.
You can be assured that all information you provide to a Genesys wealth adviser will be treated in the strictest confidence and stored securely.
During the advice process,you will be provided with several key documents, one of which is the Financial Services Guide (FSG). It’s vital you read this, as it contains important information about the range of services, how your adviser is paid for those services and what happens if you are not happy with the advice and other services you receive. It’s important that you take the time to discuss the information in the FSG with your adviser, and seek further clarification if there is anything you don’t understand. You can access more information about how our advisers are remunerated from the Fees page.
Proceeding to a Statement of Advice
Once your adviser has gathered the relevant information to formulate strategies in line with your needs and objectives, the advice will be provided to you in a financial plan, which is also referred to as a Statement of Advice (SoA).
The SoA provides you with:
1. The needs and objectives that you have agreed to be addressed.
2. A statement of the personal information regarding your current position.
3. A summary and detailed analysis of the recommended strategies, how they will help you achieve your objectives, any risks and implications and how the strategies will work.
4. A summary and detail of any investment recommendations and rationale behind those recommendations.
5. Disclosure of fees/commissions associated with the advice and its implementation.
Presentation of the Statement of Advice
Once the SoA has been completed your adviser will request an appointment with you to present the advice. By law, a Statement of Advice must be provided when personal advice is provided to a client. As previously indicated, an SoA provides detailed understanding of your current situation and what you need to do to realise your goals. This appointment is an important opportunity to discuss any concerns, have questions answered and allows you to take the time with your adviser to work through the recommendations and understand them fully before proceeding to implementation.
Implementation
Once you are satisfied that you understand the recommendations of your adviser, and the rationale behind them, you will need to provide your adviser with authority to proceed with implementing those recommendations.
Ongoing review
It's important once your plan has been implemented, that you continue to liaise with your adviser to ensure that the plan remains up to date. You should review your financial plan at least every 12 months or whenever your personal or financial circumstances change.
Life brings challenges and changes regularly, so its important to review your financial plan in line with any life changes to ensure it remains appropriate for you and what you are seeking to acheive in your lifetime.