What Should You Ask Before Hiring a Financial Adviser?

The aim is not to put an adviser through a vocabulary test. Two advisers may both promise “holistic planning” while offering quite different work. A useful question exposes that difference before fees begin or assets move.

In this article

1. Who am I appointing, and what may they do?

Ask for the licensed entity's name and FSP number, the adviser's role, permitted activities and any relevant restrictions or supervision. Verify the entity through the FSCA authorised-provider search. If the adviser is a representative, establish which provider accepts responsibility for their work.

The General Code's provider-disclosure requirements cover legal status, authorised services, compliance contacts and representative supervision. A trading name on a presentation is not a substitute for that information. General Code, section 5.

Qualifications and experience are a different inquiry. Ask what experience is relevant to your actual problem: retiring from an employer fund, coordinating business and household finances, or planning around foreign assets. A qualification is not a guarantee of sound advice; a licence does not establish specialist experience in every field.

Evidence to retain: the provider disclosure, named representative and the result of the status check. Resolve mismatched names or unexplained restrictions before relying on the appointment.

2. What will I receive, and what is outside the scope?

Ask the adviser to describe the first piece of work in concrete terms. Will you receive an investment recommendation, a retirement cash-flow assessment, a review of existing arrangements, or a broader financial plan? What information must you supply, when is the work due, and what would require a separate specialist or fee?

“We look at everything” can mean that the adviser notices an estate issue and refers it to an attorney. It does not necessarily mean drafting a will, providing a tax opinion or implementing a cross-border estate structure. A clearly limited engagement can be useful. The problem is an important task that each party assumes the other is doing.

Ask whether the work can conclude that no product change is needed. That does not mean advice must be free if nothing is sold. It establishes whether analysis is a defined service or merely a stage in a proposed transaction.

Evidence to retain: a written scope with deliverables, exclusions, dependencies and the fee for each stage. Separate a review from any later implementation authority.

3. What will I pay in total, and who receives it?

Ask for initial and ongoing costs, in rand for your proposed amount as well as the applicable percentage or fixed-fee basis. Clarify VAT, commissions, platform charges, underlying investment expenses, discretionary management and any performance fee. Identify charges already embedded in another figure so that the total does not double-count them.

The General Code requires service and remuneration disclosures, including the purpose and recipient of relevant charges and the consequences of ending payment obligations. A single headline percentage does not answer all of those questions. General Code, section 7, as amended.

Then ask what service continues in exchange for the recurring advice charge. A statement showing the fund balance is not necessarily evidence of a household planning review. Equally, a recurring fee need not pay for unlimited legal, tax and administrative work. The agreement should make that boundary visible.

Evidence to retain: one reconciled cost schedule and the service agreement. The Library's financial-advice cost explanation shows why comparing only advice percentages can miss the larger cost.

Two proposals that should not yet be ranked

Suppose an invented couple nearing retirement requests help. Neither proposal below is a ClearGauge quotation or a market-price benchmark.

On R3 million, A's annual advice fee is R15,000 before platform and investment expenses. B's R18,000 is a one-time assessment fee. Neither is an all-in first-year price, and they buy different work. Calling A “R3,000 cheaper” conceals both the service gap and the time-period mismatch.

If the couple already has a sound retirement plan and only needs investment implementation, A's narrower service could be relevant. If the unresolved question is whether retirement is affordable, an investment-only proposal leaves the central task unanswered. B still needs its assumptions, deliverable and exclusions tested; a broader description does not prove better analysis.

The next step is to obtain the missing scope and costs, not award either adviser a point. The comparison above preserves the invented terms and the fee calculation.

4. Who can act after I sign?

Ask whether each document authorises advice, implementation, ongoing service, discretionary trading or an asset transfer. Those are different permissions. An adviser may recommend a switch that requires your instruction, while an appointed discretionary manager may trade within an agreed mandate without individual approval.

If the proposal uses a DFM, ask for its name, mandate and separate charge. The DFM explanation examines the responsibilities that remain with the adviser. Do not assume that a planning appointment by itself authorises every investment action; or that revoking one mandate automatically terminates all the others.

Evidence to retain: the actual documents requiring signatures, with each authority explained. A blank or materially incomplete form is not an acceptable substitute for a reviewed instruction.

5. How will I see the reasoning behind a recommendation?

Ask how your objectives, obligations, existing arrangements and capacity for loss will be assessed. Request an anonymised example of how the firm explains assumptions and alternatives, without expecting another client's confidential information.

For your own eventual recommendation, the record should let you understand why the proposed course fits the facts used. When a replacement is proposed, ask what will be lost, what costs or tax consequences arise, and why an adjustment to the existing arrangement would not suffice. The 2020 General Code amendments strengthen the treatment of replacement implications and limitations where an analysis is restricted.

“The new fund has performed better” is an incomplete answer if the real issue is dependable income, access or a guarantee being surrendered. Conversely, retaining an existing product is not automatically prudent merely because replacement has costs. The relevant evidence must address the actual problem.

Evidence to retain: the advice record and supporting comparisons when advice is delivered. At the appointment stage, establish the process and promised output; do not mistake a sample report for analysis of your circumstances.

6. What triggers a review, and who follows through?

Ask who initiates the agreed review and what happens between scheduled meetings if you retire, sell a business, lose income or need a large withdrawal. Identify what information the adviser needs from you and how a material change is acknowledged.

“Contact us whenever you need anything” is friendly but incomplete. It does not establish whether the named adviser is available, whether another professional covers an absence, or whether the matter falls outside the fee. A useful agreement sets the routine cadence and the process for urgent changes without promising that every market headline warrants a new plan.

Evidence to retain: the review arrangement, contact responsibility and scope of additional work. The measure is whether an important household change reaches someone able to assess it.

7. What happens if the service disappoints or I leave?

Ask for the internal complaints process and the applicable external route. The FAIS Ombud explains that a complainant must first try to resolve the matter with the responding party and keep the relevant record. Its jurisdiction and deadlines matter; the existence of a complaints route does not guarantee recovery or cover every dispute.

For an ordinary termination, establish the notice period, outstanding fees, access to records and whether any product or platform charge continues. Ending an advice relationship need not require selling every investment. If a transfer is proposed, its costs and consequences deserve their own assessment.

Evidence to retain: complaint contacts, termination terms and the records you can take away. An explanation should distinguish terminating advice from disposing of an asset.

When is an unanswered question reasonable?

An adviser may reasonably decline to say whether you should transfer an RA before reviewing its terms, your other retirement benefits and the costs. That restraint differs from declining to disclose who will receive a fee. Personal recommendations require investigation; the proposed service's identity, authority and charging basis should be explainable.

For example, “I need the existing policy schedule before assessing the exit cost” identifies both missing evidence and a next step. “There are never any meaningful exit costs” asks you to accept a conclusion without the document. Neither a quick answer nor a slow answer is inherently better. Ask what information is missing, who obtains it, whether obtaining it is chargeable and when the conclusion will be revisited.

A sensible appointment sequence can therefore have two decisions. First, agree a bounded investigation with known costs and no assumed transfer. Then consider the recommendation and any implementation mandate once the facts are available. That sequence is not required for every engagement, but it prevents signing implementation documents merely to discover what is being recommended.

Turn the answers into an appointment record

Make a note with four columns: question, written answer, supporting document, unresolved point. Mark a point resolved only when the answer and the document agree. A promise to send a fee schedule is an outstanding item, not evidence of what the schedule will say.

ClearGauge's judgement is that one material unresolved issue; such as unexplained authority over investments or uncertainty about the main deliverable; can matter more than six polished answers. There is no useful universal pass mark for an appointment. The decision needs enough clarity to know what you are buying, what you are authorising and who is accountable.

This article is an appointment-preparation guide, not an assessment of a particular adviser. It does not establish that ClearGauge or another firm is suitable for your circumstances. Keep the completed record with the proposal so that later service can be compared with the agreement actually made.

Sources and scope

Reviewed 6 September 2026. Legal references identify provider disclosure, service costs and the amended advice-analysis requirements; practical questions and the comparison record are ClearGauge's editorial method. FSCA supplies status verification and the FAIS Ombud its complaint route. The example uses invented fees and services. It preserves the distinction between an introductory discussion, a paid analysis and authority to implement a recommendation.