“The meeting takes an hour. Writing it up properly takes the rest of my evening.”
AI for financial advisers that takes on the write-up. The advice stays yours.
Notes, report drafts, review bookings and data requests run on a system, so the file is up to date before you leave the office.
I'm Daniel Andrews. I run a law firm in East Sussex and build its systems myself. I help small advice firms in Eastbourne, Bexhill and Tunbridge Wells get the write-up off their evenings. If a BNI contact sent you here, it's because I've been part of BNI for 20 years.
A typical evening, after a day of reviews
- 6pmWriting up two meetingsFile notes from a page of scribbles
- 7pmStarting a suitability reportObjectives, attitude to risk, and why this recommendation
- 8pmChasing pension valuationsLetters of authority still sitting with providers
- 9pmUpdating a cash flow planNew salary, new pot values, new spending figures
- 10pmBed, with next month's reviews unbookedAnd no quick way to show which were offered
Ten meetings a week, and a write-up for every one
Every meeting ends with a write-up, and the write-ups wait for the evening.
“I'd rather hold ten good meetings a week than write up five.”
“My family can tell it's review season from the laptop on the kitchen table.”
“Clients pay for an ongoing service. Every review that slips worries me.”
“If the FCA asked me to show every review I'd offered, it would take a week of searching.”
When every review waits for you, you own a job, not a firm
You set up on your own to give advice your way and set your own hours. Then the client bank grew. Each new client adds a review every year, and each review adds notes, data, a report and a letter.
If the file only moves when you write it up, the firm can't grow without longer evenings. Take three weeks off and reviews slip. You've built a job, not a business.
I'll help you build the firm behind you, with the system I used to get my own evenings back: see where the time goes, put the repeat work on systems, and spend the hours you win back on the business. For an advice firm, that means reviews booked from a calendar, data in before meetings, and notes and reports arriving as drafts to check. Once your review process is written down, a paraplanner or administrator could run it with you. That's the approach behind how I help professional firms become businesses.
What can AI for financial advisers take off your desk?
The writing and gathering around the advice. AI can draft meeting notes and a first version of a suitability report in your template. Automation can book annual reviews, request valuations and updated figures for cash flow planning, and record what was offered and delivered. The recommendation, the checking and the sign-off stay with you.
| Job | How it often works now | Set up properly |
|---|---|---|
| New enquiries | Returned between meetings, sometimes days later. | A same-day reply, a link to book, and a short questionnaire. |
| Meeting notes | Typed up from memory at night. | A draft note from the meeting, with the client told first, checked before it goes on file. |
| Suitability reports | Started from a blank template. | A first draft from the fact-find and your notes, in your template, for you to rewrite and sign. |
| Annual reviews | Booked when you remember, and hard to evidence later. | Invitations ahead of each anniversary, with offers, bookings and declines all recorded. |
| Cash flow planning data | Salary and valuations chased at the last minute. | A data request weeks before each review, with provider valuations asked for early. |
| Review packs and letters | Put together by hand the night before. | Pack and follow-up letter drafted from the file, ready for your check. |
What does the FCA expect from a suitability report and an ongoing service?
Where COBS 9.4 applies, a suitability report must at least set out the client's demands and needs, explain why the recommendation is suitable, and explain any possible disadvantages. Under COBS 6.1A, an adviser charge paid over time generally has to be for a disclosed ongoing service the client can cancel.
COBS 9.4 covers reports on personal pensions, among other things. MiFID and optional exemption business, and insurance-based investment products, follow COBS 9A instead. Under COBS 9.5, firms retain suitability records for a minimum of three years, five for life policies and personal pensions, and indefinitely for pension transfers.
In February 2025 the FCA published its review of ongoing advice at 22 of the largest advice firms. Suitability reviews were delivered in around 83% of cases, and clients declined or didn't reply in a further 15%. One weakness it highlighted was record-keeping too thin to evidence delivery of the service.
For cash flow modelling, the FCA says firms should use up-to-date salary information and up-to-date market values of investible assets. That's data gathering, and it can start weeks ahead.
- Review invitations sent and logged ahead of each anniversary, showing what was offered, held or declined.
- Valuations and updated figures requested before the review, not during it.
AI note-takers, client data and networks
The FCA's 2025 survey of advice firms, published in April 2026, found firms exploring AI for efficiency, such as meeting notes. Among small firms of one to five advisers, around 14% said they will deploy AI within advice processes. The regulator has said it will use its current frameworks, the Consumer Duty among them, instead of AI-specific regulation.
A recorded review can capture health and family details. Before an AI note-taker goes live, the ICO's guidance on the right to be informed says clients must be told about that new use of their data. Its guidance on AI and data protection sets out how UK GDPR applies, and is being reviewed after the Data (Use and Access) Act.
Please note: this page summarises FCA and ICO material as general information. It is not legal, regulatory or compliance advice. Your compliance consultant, network or professional body can tell you what applies to your firm.
Which part of a review takes you longest: the notes, the data or the report? Tell me, and that's where we'll start.
Book a free 30-minute callWhat I'd set up first for a financial adviser
Reviews first, because the ongoing service is what clients pay for.
A review calendar that books itself
Every client's review date sits in one calendar. Invitations go out ahead of time, and each offer, booking and decline is recorded.
Data in before the meeting
A request for updated income, spending and plan values goes out weeks ahead, so the cash flow plan is current at the meeting.
Notes drafted from the meeting
With the client told in advance, AI drafts the file note and action list. You correct it while it's fresh.
Report first drafts in your template
The suitability report starts from your own template and the updated fact-find. You write the reasoning and sign it off.
How do I choose AI tools for financial advisers?
Look for a tool that works with the system you or your network use, drafts in your own templates, shows where each statement came from, keeps data under a UK GDPR data processing agreement, and never sends anything to a client without your sign-off.
- Lets you tell clients plainly when a meeting is recorded, and what happens to the recording.
- Links each line in a draft back to the note or document it came from.
As examples, not recommendations, intelliflo Office, Plannr and CURO from Time4Advice are adviser CRMs used by UK firms. None of them has any commercial link with me. If you also arrange mortgages or general insurance, my pages for mortgage brokers and insurance brokers cover that side.
Why a law firm Managing Partner?
I know the evening shift well. For years my week ran to 60 to 70 hours, and I was often still at it at 2am. Stepping back and putting the firm on systems changed that, and the firm is now four to five times the size it was when I started. My own evenings belong to two children and a football team I coach, so I understand why you want yours back.
Advice firms and law firms have plenty in common: a regulator, a file that must tell the story, and clients who trust you with private details. I'm Managing Partner of a law firm with two offices and around 30 people, and I still practise as a solicitor. This consultancy doesn't give legal advice, and the SRA doesn't regulate it.
I built it in my own firm first, including an AI-assisted marketing workflow in which automatic checks come before any human sign-off. Because the consultancy is new, I can't point to adviser clients yet. Read the story behind the consultancy.
Other professions I help
Accountants and bookkeepers
Records chased on a timetable, MTD quarters on one screen and new clients onboarded in one link, so deadline season stops taking your evenings.
For accountants and bookkeepersInsuranceInsurance brokers
Renewals prepared weeks ahead, commercial clients chased for their figures, and claims updates sent before anyone has to ring you.
For insurance brokersMortgagesMortgage brokers
Fact-finds drafted, payslips and bank statements chased, and every case tracked from application to completion without the evening phone calls.
For mortgage brokersPropertyEstate and letting agents
Offers put in writing, chains chased, vendor updates drafted and lettings dates tracked, so the agency keeps moving after the last viewing.
For estate and letting agentsDesign and surveyArchitects and surveyors
Fee proposals, revision registers, planning dates and site-photo reports handled by systems you check, so the practice isn't run from the kitchen table.
For architects and surveyorsSafetyHealth and safety consultants
Site notes turned into draft reports, client actions chased and review dates booked, while every assessment still waits for your signature.
For health and safety consultantsQuestions from financial advisers
Is there AI for financial advisers in the UK that drafts suitability reports?
AI can draft one if it's given your template, the fact-find and your notes. A draft isn't advice, though. You remain responsible for the recommendation, so treat the output as a first version to check, correct and sign.
Can an appointed representative use their own AI tools?
Check with your principal first. The principal is responsible for your regulated business, and may set which tools you use. If their list is fixed, we automate the steps around it instead.
Will AI help me deliver the ongoing advice service?
It can make delivery easier to run and easier to show. Invitations, data requests, bookings and declines are logged as they happen, so your records keep pace with the service you actually give.
What should never be left to AI?
The recommendation, the conversation about attitude to risk and capacity for loss, and the final check. AI can sound certain and still be wrong, so an adviser should read every note and report before it is filed or sent.
Leave the office with the file already written
Book a free 30-minute call. Walk me through your last review, from invitation to report, and I'll show you which steps a system could take. No jargon and no hard sell.