Peter & Jan

Jan
Hi, I’m Jan, and this is my husband, Pete. We’ve been clients of Nick’s for a few months.

Pete  
Previously, we’d had financial advisers, but I would describe them more as “pension providers”. And we felt that we needed something that covered more than just a basic pension, and looked at the other assets that we have, the other savings, with a view to long-term planning, bearing in mind the ages that we both are.

Jan  
Nick’s approach to planning is far more personal. He takes an interest, and he’s looked at us as a couple – where we are in our life and our age – and takes into consideration where we do or don’t have savings and our wills. He’s updated those and helped us with that sort of planning.

Pete  
I think it’s very much objective-based. One of the early discussions with Nick was about what we wanted to achieve through our financial planning. Based on that, he’s got some smart software that’s enabled us to see, in a very visual way, different permutations of how we move our money, where we save our money, and what goes into pensions, etc. It’s a much more focused way of understanding the different opportunities that are in front of us.

Jan  
We chose Nick as our financial adviser because when we had conversations with some very close friends, they explained that they use Nick and had done for quite a number of years. They talked about him as such a nice guy to start with, and also that he really looks at them as a whole and what they wanted to achieve. And we thought, “Well, we’re not getting any of that from where we are at the moment, so let’s get in touch with him.” And that’s what we did. And he certainly does get to know you before he starts trying to put any sort of plan in place.

Pete  
At the moment, the financial future is looking pretty good. We have a small-ish business, we’ve recently employed our daughter to join the business. So we see that as being a potential long-term future for the business, and we’ve added that into the financial planning so that we can look at the best way of managing that business going forward, giving some parity to our son, who isn’t in the business. But we’ll certainly share some of the equity from that business. So, Nick’s advice on that has been very helpful.

Jan  
It was very easy to become a client of Nick’s. We had a couple of meetings, just generally chit-chatting, him getting to know us and looking at our finances, where they were and what we were doing. He set us homework to set out everything that we spend, which was a bit of an eye-opener, where it was being spent and where it wasn’t. From there he set out a plan for us to get things moving in the right direction.

Pete  
We absolutely made the right decision switching to Nick. He has been a breath of fresh air, he’s turned what is a pretty grey subject into something that’s actually quite interesting. We look forward to meeting with him. Our only regret is that we didn’t do this 10 years ago.

Jan  
I would describe Nick as a very positive person. He’s extremely easy to get on with and very honest. He’ll always tell you if he thinks you’re doing the right thing, and if you’re not, he’ll give you advice as to what he thinks you should do. So, a very, very nice guy.

Pete  
We feel much more comfortable about our financial future having worked with Nick. He’s brought quite a number of issues into perspective, some things that we hadn’t thought about long-term such as estate planning, changing our wills, and making sure that whatever we’re doing going forward is done in a tax-efficient way. It’s been a breath of fresh air, and we both feel much more confident about our financial future.

Jan  
The best thing about working with Nick, I would say, is that he’s an enthusiastic guy. Very honest and confident. He knows what he’s talking about. I would always take his advice and if I had a problem, I would go to him and ask him what he thinks.

Pete  
The best pieces of advice that Nick has given us so far; one relates to our personal finances, getting our wills and inheritance tax planning in place, which has made a lot of sense. And the other one that has been very beneficial to us is how you move money between a business and personal finances in a tax-efficient way, and that’s already reaped enormous benefits.

Pete  
I would definitely recommend Nick. In fact, we have already recommended him to a couple of friends simply based on the recommendations he’s given us. Because at our time in life, many of our friends are facing the same challenges and the same situations so it makes sense that they get the same sort of advice we’ve had, which we’re extremely happy with.