Issues facing Trustees and Employers come in all shapes and sizes – and so does our advice.
Perhaps it is the fact that we have been based around Saville Row in Mayfair for over 20 years, but our ethos has always been to provide advice to clients that is pragmatic and bespoke rather than off the peg. However, unlike tailoring, we do not think this needs to come at a cost premium.
Our approach to all our relationships with our clients, and the work we undertake, can be summarised as follows:
- Don’t Panic – there is often a straightforward solution
- We won’t create a mountain where a molehill will do the job
- Feel comfortable to ask us for help
- Trusted relationships are key. This won’t happen if you are worried you will be incurring hundreds of pounds of costs just by picking up the phone to raise an issue with no obvious benefit.
- It is often simpler and more efficient to ask for help early on as long as you are confident your advisers can give you practical advice when you need it.
- Be confident you’ll understand the answers
- Our role is to make the complicated easy to understand.
- If it is not understandable it is not worth doing.
- Beware of CFGPs – Consultancy Fee Generating Projects!
These are the qualities you will find working with us, whatever your situation: if you are Trustees of a closed DB scheme then you are probably looking for someone ideally suited to manage all aspects of this cost efficiently and sympathetically with the members always in mind. This could be on a one stop shop basis or for individual actuarial, administration, consultancy or investment advice services.
If you are an Employer looking to save costs for managing legacy arrangements now that DC Benefits are your focus for current employees then we are well placed to help with both of these types of structures, to advise on benefit structures for the future and formulating a fair decommissioning plan for the volatile DB liabilities.
If you are a Trustee and the sponsoring employer is about to, or has already, become insolvent then we have a wealth of experience of helping trustees and members through the PPF/FAS process, and don’t see it is a cash cow to be milked or a trough to get snouts into!
Our unique approach to pension scheme investment advice aims to more closely match the investment strategy to the liability/funding strategy which reduces volatility without sacrificing return or increasing management costs. It is also likely to reduce ongoing consultancy costs as well. This approach is appropriate for many schemes and is attractive to Trustees and Employers alike and gives benefits that would be difficult to match for all but the very largest schemes, but at a fraction of the cost.
If you would like a refreshing approach that looks for ways to work with you and help you manage the past as well as the future then we think we are worth a closer look.
Please read on and feel free to contact any of the partners for a chat.
We provide a good service, are good to work with, and are a bit different – in a good way!