Probably the single most important aspect in report writing is relating your recommendations to your client circumstances and because no two clients are the same then your reports need to be unique. There will be elements of standardisation but by building your reports with unique content you will be reducing compliance risk and making it more relevant to your client and in turn it make it easier for your client to comprehend your advice.
The FCA rules do state that a suitability report should explain why the firm has concluded that the recommendation is suitable for the client having regard to the information provided by the client, so please do relate your recommendations specifically to your clients circumstances and keep them ‘Unique’.



Pension Transfers – considering a workplace pension
Alistair MacDougall Compliance Defined Benefit, FCA, Pension, Pension Transfer, PI, Switch, transfer
We recently reviewed a pension transfer report where the client was recommended to transfer out of the defined benefit scheme into the client’s pre-existing SIPP. We considered that the recommendation to transfer appeared to be appropriate. However, the client had what the FCA calls an ‘available qualifying scheme’, more commonly referred to as a […]