Family law

When your firm’s Family team meets one of our wealth advisers, their role is to learn about your firm and your preferred way of working and to find out how we can become part of a team you build around a client. They will discuss our services with you, the role of our advisers and explain how we can support you and your clients.

• Consultations – Our financial planners will be pleased to answer early stage enquiries before any formal steps are taken, but which confirm crucial financial considerations – such as: can I afford to get divorced?
• Helping to achieve full disclosure – we understand the importance of conducting full due diligence when working with a third party. Our wealth adviser will therefore discuss and provide you with full due diligence information and explain our fees. Our goal is to make this process as easy as possible for you.
• Referrals – One of our financial planners can meet with your client separately or, if you prefer, have a joint meeting with you to establish what advice is required

The approach can be decided on a case-by-case basis.

We believe it is crucial that our wealth managers collaborate with you as early as possible in any proceedings.

By introducing us early into the process we can:

• Support you in identifying the matrimonial property belonging to your client and obtaining the necessary valuations and vouching.
• In the event that there are special circumstances, for example, to help you in tracing the source of funds used to acquire the matrimonial property.
• Understand where challenges should be made to the information provided by the other side and what further financial questions it may be appropriate to ask.
• If necessary, to provide a valuation of non-matrimonial property investments such as stocks and shares and any other financial assets.
• Establish and clarify a client’s tax position and give advice on the most tax-efficient way to manage their assets.
• Undertake a cashflow forecasting exercise to help support a client’s capital and income requirements over the long term.

A financial planner will work hard to understand the emotional aspects of a case. They will support your own fact-find process, as required, especially when dealing with complex financial assets.

At this stage, their main role is to support the client’s understanding of their future financial security. They will use everyday language to explain any complex financial matters on subjects such as:

• Pensions
• Specialist investments
• Cashflow planning
• Protection
• Tax

At this stage, many clients have to consider investments, pension planning and the implementation of orders, tax and other major financial issues for the first time.

We recognise this can be daunting for them and so we look to make this as easy as possible.

Following a settlement, we can help to implement certain orders given by the court and activate plans for ongoing financial security. We can help in a number of ways:

• Implement a pension sharing order leading to the establishment of a new pension arrangement within prescribed time limits, recommendation of a suitable investment strategy and/or the management of the client’s pension income needs.
• Cash management is often a sensible starting point following a high net worth divorce. It ensures the client’s capital is secured in the best place and gives them the breathing space to make any plans.
• Build a portfolio of investments based on the client’s personal circumstances, objectives and attitude to risk.
• Provide ongoing advice and management of the client’s current and future tax position.