Fair Value Statement

About Us

Introduction

This document is aimed at providing you with a brief overview of our firm and to introduce our services.

In this document, we intend to illustrate how we assess value and whether there is fair value between the total price of the service and the benefits and their quality that our clients receive.

About us

Clements Financial Planning Ltd, operates in a professional setting, conveniently located in the City of London, the hub of the financial district providing financial advice to its clients.

Clements Financial Planning Ltd is a well-established financial advice practice who pride themselves on providing their clients with access to top quality holistic financial planning advice from a trusted brand.

Headed by Theresa Clements who has more than 30 years of experience working as a financial advisor and manager. Theresa is recognised for her experience and expertise. Clements Financial planning and works exclusively with clients who have been referred for advise by existing clients and professionals.

OUR CORE VALUES

We are committed to providing the highest standard of financial advice and service possible.

Our clients’ goals are of paramount importance and therefore our systems and procedures place clients at the heart of our business.

The mission of Clements Financial Planning is to provide top quality independent advice. We wish to establish a successful partnership with our clients, and product providers that respect the interests and the goals of each party. Our aim is to help clients build upon their wealth, protect it, and develop plans to pass it on.

We will strive to maintain our current customer base by providing our personalised services in a manner whereby the fair treatment of customers is consistently at the heart of the business.

Success will be measured by our clients choosing us above the competition because of their belief in our ability to meet or exceed their expectations on cost, service, and expertise.

WHY CHOOSE US

We Provide Independent Financial Advice from the whole of market. We are investment agnostic – whatever our clients’ objectives, we aim to find an appropriate strategy.

We will advise and make a recommendation for clients after we have assessed their needs. Our recommendations will be based on a comprehensive and fair analysis of the market. Above all, we will only make a recommendation when we know it is suitable for our clients.

Target Market

Our service proposition has been designed to meet the needs and objectives of our clients and to ensure fair value is received by engaging with our service.

Individuals and Families

Clements Financial Planning current target market and client base consists of individuals and families.

We work mostly with individuals and families who are either still working and building their assets, planning for retirement, or enjoying their retirement years, and looking towards legacy planning. Our service proposition is typically suitable for clients who have liquid assets of at least £50,000, total assets including property of at least £200,000, or household income in excess of £50,000 per annum. However, there can be circumstances when our services are appropriate for those who do not meet these criteria. We recognise that mass market consumers with low levels of investable assets will not be in the target market for our ongoing service. However, our service does provide value to consumers who have amassed as little as £50,000 to help them ensure that they invest sensibly in mainstream assets and to help them maintain their savings discipline.

Small and Medium Sized Businesses

We look after small business Directors who plan for their retirement making sure they consider tax efficient strategies suitable for those who have built their own businesses and a professional’s.

Business Owners and Entrepreneurs: We assist business owners and entrepreneurs in optimizing their financial affairs, managing business cash flows, planning for growth, and ensuring smooth business succession. Our services focus on areas such as business valuation, risk management, tax planning, and investment strategies.

Employee Benefit Programs: We provide guidance and advisory services to SMEs seeking assistance in designing and implementing employee benefit programs, including retirement plans, health insurance, and other employee incentives. Our target market includes businesses of varying sizes seeking competitive and comprehensive employee benefits packages.

Many clients have capital in excess of their needs. Recent retirees and those close to retirement or part time work form a major part of our client base.

Tangible Benefits

The tangible benefits of working with us include:

• Investment advice
• Tax Planning
• Pension advice
• Financial administration outsourced to us
• Financial Forecasting/Cashflow Modelling
• Life Insurance and Protection advice
• Inheritance and legacy planning
• Employee benefits for small businesses
• Business protection advice for owner directors
• Introduction to other professionals
• Periodic e-mail/newsletter

The intangible benefits include:

• Working with a professional financial planner provides expertise and peace of mind
• We build multi decade trust-based relationships with our clients. We get to know what really matters most to them and their families. Helping clients to achieve their goals and objectives.
• Our relationships are often the longest standing relationships our clients have. Clients rely on us to achieve their financial plans that are designed and managed them. This trust is created and occurs with solutions that achieve the plans.
• Behavioural coaching (so that clients don’t make financial mistakes)
• Support to spouse/partner and wider family on death
• Working with a professional financial planner provides expertise and peace of mind whilst giving access to client support and reassurance.

The Value of our Service

Network Member Firm

We are an Appointed Representative (“Member Firm”) of Best Practice Group IFA Limited. The Network provide an institutional regulatory supervision and compliance framework service which provides us with a high level of regulatory assurance and leading-edge client management systems.

Why did we choose the Best Practice Group IFA Ltd Network to work with? This high quality and financially sound organisation ultimately provide us with a high level of assurance and comfort around the regulatory framework of the proposition and services we deliver to you, our clients.

How does working with Benchmark benefit our clients? Best Practice Group IFA Limited is part of Benchmark, which is wholly owned by Schroders.

By leveraging the quality and services of an organisation like Benchmark, a Schroders plc group company, we have comfort that we will remain at the leading edge of our profession, ensuring we maintain a “Best Practice” approach to serving our clients. Many of the benefits we derive, we see as having direct value add relevance for our clients, including:

• The provision of an independent complaints handling process for all of our clients,
• enhanced professional indemnity insurance
• integrated client technology systems, including the Wealth Platform
• independent compliance supervision of our advisers and the suitability of our client advice.

Initial Advice

BASIS OF MY ADVICE – What we can do for you.

All information is held in the strictness of confidence.

Each new client to is offered an initial meeting at ‘no cost’ to the client and gives an opportunity for both the client to get to know Clements Financial Planning Limited without any financial commitment. This initial meeting provides clarity of processes and potential costs along with full regulatory disclosures.

I will complete a detailed fact find so we can understand the circumstance, specific needs, and objectives to determine the best advice and suitability for each client individually.

Our full fact-finding exercise is undertaken which includes.

• Establish your goals and objectives / needs and wants – this gives clarity to any future advice and that this is aligned with your objectives.
• Establish your priorities – it is sometimes necessary to prioritise objectives. This step of the process will establish if this is the case and set out those priorities.
• Establish your attitude to risk and capacity for loss – this will aid us in ensuring that any investment solution is in line with your attitudes.

Our mainstream service is to act on behalf of the client for the purpose of arranging and advising on protection pensions and Investments for example ISA and lump sum investment.

Once we have agreed the costs of the advice, we will then undertake research to provide a personal recommendation(s) and related information relevant to your individual circumstances. I will only advise and make a personal recommendation to you after we have assessed your needs based on a comprehensive and fair analysis of the relevant market; this will include all retail investment products which are capable of meeting your investment, pension needs and circumstances and will be both unbiased and unrestricted.

With your permission we will then review any existing plans you may have and establish if these are suitable, and recommend an alternative if not suitable, as well as researching potential solutions to meet any shortfalls in your current planning.

At the end of this process, you will have a clear understanding of your new financial strategy, how this meets your goals and objectives, and of all the associated risks and costs.

We will present any recommendations in writing and meet with you to discuss these recommendations and agree any implementation.

If after due consideration you would like to accept our recommendation(s), we will then implement them and arrange any product and /or related service on your behalf.

This process enables the adviser to identify areas in which immediate initial advice may be beneficial and areas where our ongoing service may help you in reaching your financial goals and objectives.

Ongoing Advice Services – Annual Review

For our clients, this is an integral part of the financial planning journey and our annual ongoing advisory service. It gives us an opportunity to sit down with you and your family, to reflect on the past year and to look forward and consider what might be on the horizon for you in the coming years. To give reassurance and peace of mind about how the investments are tracking against goals and to review our plans in the context of any changing circumstances in your life, new goals, or changes to objectives.

We consider the outlook for markets and the economic landscape and changing tax regulations which might impact on your current plans. We make sure everything we are doing remains suitable and is aimed at helping you and your family to achieve your goals.

It presents an opportunity to think about the coming years, plans for your family, begin to consider key life stages and events and how we might need to adapt our plans for them.

Cashflow Modelling

When appropriate we will use Cashflow Modelling or other forms of financial forecasting.

This helps us to show you visually how your plan has been set up to meet your objectives.

The cashflow modelling provides a visual illustration of how a client’s investments and wealth will move over time in relation to the financial plans that we formulate to meet their goals. This gives clients considerable comfort knowing that there is some mathematical rigour to our advice and how it will help them to meet their goals.

Cashflow modelling allows us to scenario test your plans against historical market events and simulate how our clients’ goals could be impacted by these types of events. It allows us to show how risk events might impact portfolios. It’s a really great way to help you understand more about investment risks and how it translates to the plans you have in place. It helps you to feel more informed and comfortable about your plans.

Financial Protection Planning

It may be an uncomfortable subject but we all need to plan for the unforeseen in life and how this would impact ourselves and our family. We can help you to consider different scenarios which could occur and identify if there are any shortfalls in your protection planning. We can explain what options you have to address these shortfalls and how they would ensure you and your family are able to maintain your lifestyle and still meet your longer-term financial goals, in the event of ill health or death.

Access to professional tools and paraplanning resources/staff to conduct analysis and research to find the best/most suitable product. Use of trusts to provide ease of access, control etc.

Holistic Financial Planning

It is not just about monetary goals; this is about life and family and a consultative approach. This enables us to help clients to think about things they may not have considered and how plans can work together to create a cohesive timeline of advice.

IHT and Estate Planning

We work with your other professionals who have a deep knowledge and understanding of HMRC tax rules in relation to clients and their estate’s assets. We can help to understand the value of future liabilities and design and implement strategies to reduce this burden, often saving clients thousands of pounds in potential tax charges. This provides real value and peace of mind that your loved ones will be looked after when they are gone.

Retirement Planning

A key life phase. This is an area of planning which deserves significant time in reviewing for our clients each year. Often in the background, checking on progress of plans and investments you have made to fund your life in retirement. Adapting to market swings and modelling various impact scenarios. Retirement planning is one of the most valuable services we provide our clients.

More than 50% of our clients are currently in either full or partial retirement, following our advice and drawing on their assets to live a stress-free life. Our retirement planning takes the worry away from our clients.

Philosophy and Investment Research Methodology

• Our investment proposition is researched to provide the most suitable investment solutions to cater for your needs. We choose to outsource investment management to professional money managers. Our skill is in selecting which ones to blend together to build portfolios aimed at meeting your goals.

We have the time and professional skillset to monitor your investments and the investment managers. To make sure we stay on track to meet your goals. We tend to your investments while you give all the other things in life your full attention.

• Our investment proposition is researched to provide the most suitable investment solutions to cater for your needs.
• This ultimately gives our clients great comfort that their investments are being managed by investment professionals and their financial plans are being looked after by highly qualified financial planning professionals. This is the value that a relationship with our firm provides. It’s what our clients pay for.

Discretionary Fund Management / Multi Asset Portfolios etc.

We recommend discretionary investment management solutions for clients. We believe this adds value when required by providing a bespoke Service.

With a Discretionary Fund Management (DFM) service, the selected manager will create an investment portfolio tailored to your specific investment objectives and in accordance with your agreed investment objectives. A portfolio management team will find suitable investments that take into account your attitude to risk and your objectives with the choice of asset classes and how much being invested in each reflecting your financial goals.

The portfolio will be managed on a regular basis, and all daily investment decisions will be the responsibility of the discretionary manager. A DFM arrangement means that the appointed manager makes decisions as to which investments to buy or sell based on their judgments as to how these individually and collectively meet the mandate agreed at outset. Whilst you will receive periodic reports you will not be told in advance of any fund changes or exposures to more illiquid investments such as property or to higher risk investments such as smaller companies or emerging markets.

I believe being comfortable with the DFM person who manages your money and feeling able to approach and talk to them and raise any questions you may have is extremely important. Just as important as the personality is the investment performance, the strategy used, and the risk taken in achieving this performance. Like many others investment managers, the investment strategy is risk based and monitored using sophisticated modelling tools.

Clements Financial Planning will continually discuss risk having interpreted the results of our risk profiling. The DFM will then have the mandate to propose and implement an investment strategy in line with your attitude to risk, capacity for loss and overall investment objectives. Our approach means that our time is focused on you. We let the professional investment managers monitor the markets on a day-to-day basis. We feel this combination delivers you the best value.

Tax Efficiency

Making sure we consider tax reliefs and allowances, enables clients to maximise their after-tax wealth. If you don’t take advantage of annual tax reliefs, then you could quite literally be paying more tax than you need to. We can evidence the amount you have potentially saved through our planning.

Market & Product Research & Analysis

To recommend the most suitable solutions for our clients, we use professional tools to conduct research and analysis of provider and product solutions. This ensures we can make recommendations to best meet your needs and goals.

These tools are typically subscription only and require a degree of knowledge and experience to use and to ensure that the output is used properly and to the benefit of our clients.

Life Goals Planning

To help clients consider their short / medium / long term goals in life and provide financial solutions to help them in their plans to achieve these goals.

Financial Coaching

Financial Coaching can add value at various times throughout the financial planning journey and help you to make considered financial decisions. These might include:

• Amounts to invest to meet your goals
• How and when to release capital or take income
• Reassurance in volatile market conditions
• Understand how markets work and the journey you can expect
• Understanding legislation and tax changes

A professional sense check – behavioural guidance – we help to take the emotion out of financial decision making and helping clients avoid falling into common mistakes.

Education Planning

Many clients want to support their children through university and we can help you put in place a financial plan to meet these costs in full or in part. This will provide you with the knowledge and peace of mind that this very important goal is in hand and will be reviewed year on year to make sure you are on track.

Market Briefings and Investment Updates

As part of our annual review service, we provide an update on the current view of the markets and a summary of any changes to legislation that may be relevant to you.

We will also contact you during the year with relevant updates in the form of email or letter and may include an accompanying magazine or brochure.

Corporate Services

We can help create and launch a tailored and competitive Benefits Package for employees. In doing this we would:

• Conduct a comprehensive needs assessments to understand employees’ preferences and requirements.
• Designing customised benefits packages that align with corporate goals and cater to diverse employee needs.

The resulting package might include one or more of the following:

• Workplace pension scheme
• Group life cover and/or critical illness.
• Income protection insurance to cover long term absence from work.
• Private Healthcare Plan
• Ancillary employee benefits and assistance which come as part of one of the above.

The benefits to the employer would be Enhanced Employee Wellbeing and Satisfaction which might be achieved through:

• Promote physical and mental health among employees.
• Creating a positive company culture that fosters loyalty and dedication.
• Help attract and retain talented individuals.
• Annual review meeting with Clements Financial Planning Adviser to ensure the package remains suitable and relevant to the firm and their employees.

The benefits to the employees might include:

• Access to value benefits at a low cost or no cost to them through employee funding.
• An understanding of the benefits being provided, and an appreciation of their use and their value.
• Access to an adviser from Clements Financial Planning Adviser to discuss financial planning matters.
• Educational communications and seminars.

Advice for Entrepreneurial Families

For those who are the owner directors of businesses, or those key individuals, our advice can help provide financial security for both the business and the individuals.

Safeguarding Shareholders’ Interests

• Identifying and evaluating potential risks to shareholders, such as the death or illness of a shareholder.
• Helping business owners understand the implications of such events on business ownership, control, and shareholder equity.

Cross-Option Agreements

• Advising on the establishment of cross-option agreements among shareholders.
• Working with the company’s legal advisors to these agreements to outline the transfer of shares in the event of death or critical illness.
• Mitigating potential conflicts between surviving shareholders and the estate of a deceased or critically ill shareholder

Funding Mechanisms

• Recommending funding mechanisms for buy-sell agreements, such as life insurance or critical illness insurance.
• Assisting in determining the appropriate level of coverage needed to fund the agreement effectively.

Tax Efficiency

• Collaborating with tax advisors and corporate accountants to ensure that the shareholder protection plan is structured to minimize tax implications for both the business and individual shareholders.

Enhanced Risk Management

• Integrating key person insurance and shareholder protection insurance into the company’s overall risk management strategy.

Increased Confidence and Assurance

• Providing peace of mind to executives, shareholders, and stakeholders knowing that the company has a plan in place to address unforeseen events.
• Demonstrating commitment to the long-term viability and sustainability of the business.

Business Legacy Preservation

• Ensuring that the business remains resilient and continues to thrive even in the face of challenging circumstances.
• Protecting the interests and legacies of founders, executives, and shareholders.

Understanding Relevant Life Insurance

• Comparing the cost-effectiveness of relevant life insurance with personal life insurance options
• Relevant life for Directors and the value which can be added through tax efficiency / business deductible expense / savings, can be illustrated in £’s and pence and can be significant.

Other Professionals

We can use our years of experience cultivating trust-based relationships with professional services firms, particularly solicitors and accountants to introduce their services if appropriate. This can save a great deal of time and effort and bring positive outcomes to our clients and their businesses.

Investment Proposition

Our investment proposition is researched to provide the most suitable investment solutions to cater for your needs. Our advisers have a range of approaches to draw on and have the expertise to match the most suitable to your needs and objectives.

We take a global approach to investment, rather than focussing or having any bias towards the UK market. We believe that investment returns can be generated through different asset classes and from different regions over time, and that a well managed, properly diversified portfolio, aligned with the risk and goals of our clients will deliver positive outcomes over the medium to long term.

Technology

One of the reasons we chose to work with Benchmark, was their technology. Something they have won numerous awards for. Ultimately backed by Schroders, we have every confidence that the security of our client’s information within Benchmark’s client management technology systems, is in very safe hands. This decision is something we know our clients expect us to get right. It’s incredibly important to them and a reason they feel safe working with us.

The Client Portal among other benefits allows us:

• To communicate and share information with our clients securely
• To provide valuations of investments held with those companies who provide feeds to the portal
• Allow the client to update their information.
• Allow our network to monitor and review our advice and communication securely and remotely to ensure the best outcomes.

Maintaining professional competency – Annual CPD

As a Financial Planner, each year we evidence the learning activities we have completed to maintain competence in our role and improve our knowledge This allows us to continue providing suitable and up to date advice to our clients, year on year.

Staff and Adviser Training and Expertise

• Advisers have the required qualifications as a minimum and are often more highly qualified.
• Specialist, expert advice across services. E.g. cash flow modelling, IHT (trusts etc), equity release advice, adverse credit mortgage advice, pension transfer advice .
• Advisers and support staff have an up-to-date experience of product providers’ requirements, processes etc.

Advisers and their colleagues know which product manufacturers provide good customer support.

Summary

As a provider of independent financial planning, advice, and wealth management services, we aim to ensure the value we add for our clients exceeds the cost paid for our services. I am completely committed to putting client’s well-being at the heart of the business. We are committed to providing the highest standard of financial advice and service possible. Our clients’ goals are of paramount importance and therefore our systems and procedures place clients at the heart of our business.

The mission of Clements Financial Planning is to provide clients with top quality independent advice meeting their interests and goals in a successful partnership. Our aim is to help clients build upon client’s wealth, protect it, and develop plans to pass it on. We provide initial and ongoing advice through to a holistic financial planning service.

We will strive to achieve our joint aims and goals by providing our services in a manner whereby the fair treatment of customers is consistently at the heart of the business.

Considering all areas included in the assessment of value, we believe the service provided is demonstrating value overall and our service proposition along with this value statement has been approved by our network, Best Practice IFA Group Limited.