Preparing documents for a first financial advice meeting
A calm packing list for clients before a wealth planning consultation — what to gather, what can wait, and how to phrase your goals.
Arriving at a first advice meeting with a carrier bag of unsorted statements wastes the hour. Arriving with nothing forces guesswork. The middle path is a short, labelled set of documents and a written list of decisions you want help with.
Bring these if you have them
Recent workplace and personal pension statements, ISA and general investment valuations, mortgage balances and remaining terms, and a simple monthly income and outgoings sketch. If you have a State Pension forecast from the government service, include it. For business owners, a brief note on salary, dividends, and company cash reserves is enough for discovery; full accounts can follow later.
Write goals in plain sentences
“Retire at 62 with £2,800 monthly after tax” is more useful than “be comfortable.” “Help our daughter with a deposit in four years” beats “support the children.” Advisers can challenge numbers, but they cannot invent priorities you have not named.
Leave these for later
Old policy documents from closed accounts that no longer hold value, every transaction list from the past decade, and speculative product brochures. If something feels sensitive — an inheritance you have not told a partner about — say so early; advice works poorly when half the balance sheet is hidden.