(Psst…this is for UK financial advice businesses only.)
A home you can trust for your smaller clients
We make it easy to migrate clients with lower levels of assets and ensure they get a brilliant ongoing service you’ll be proud to recommend.
It’s expensive to deliver exceptional ongoing advice
£600
average cost to complete an annual review
And the economics often don’t stack up for smaller clients
£562
annual revenue from a client investing £75,000 and paying 0.75% for advice
At Octopus Money, we’re on a mission to close the advice gap for good.
Using a combination of coaches and automated advice technology, our team has built a new methodology for a segment of customers that many firms find difficult to serve. To prove it works, we’ve road-tested it with thousands of our own happy clients, the majority of which have less than £200,000 invested with us.
We’re backed by Octopus Group, a certified B Corp trusted to manage over £13 billion on behalf of investors across the UK.* All Octopus businesses are founded from a shared DNA – exceptional customer service, great value and a mission to change the world for the better.
We believe in keeping the bar high
Human-led methodology
While others try to innovate the humanity out of advice, we put people at the heart of our service. Every client has a dedicated coach, who works with them 1-on-1 to explore their goals, build a plan and be on call whenever they need.
Holistic financial planning
We believe holistic advice, across all the pieces of your financial life, is the key to deeply engaging clients and delivering better outcomes. Our coaches work alongside our technology, designed with advisers, to deliver automated holistic advice.
Fair, transparent pricing
Our proposition to clients includes planning, advice, platform, products and DFM – in a single joined-up experience. All-in pricing, including fund fees, starts at 1.15%.
Why consider a new home for your smaller clients?
Free up time and unlock more value
We know that capacity is often a challenge and time is one thing you can’t make more of. You could generate at least 4x more revenue by focusing on your target clients.**
Minimise Consumer Duty risk
The FCA is increasing scrutiny on advice fees and there’s more pressure than ever to evidence good customer outcomes. We’ve designed an ongoing service from the ground up with smaller, simpler clients in mind.
We’ve been trusted to migrate more than 3,000 advised clients to Octopus
Option 1: Referral Service
If you’d like an easy way to redirect inbound enquiries (that fall outside your criteria) to a trusted partner
Option 2: Sell Existing Clients
If you have existing clients you can no longer serve, we can pay a competitive multiple
Try our calculator
Tell us about your smaller clients and we’ll tell you how we can help.
Let’s chat!
Choose a time that’s convenient for you. We can chat about your business goals and discuss how we can help.
(Prefer an email first? Get in touch here.)
Frequently Asked Questions
How can Octopus Money afford to provide regulated advice to smaller clients?
We believe that delivering brilliant advice is part empathy and part logic. So we combine coaches – who are brilliant at empathising and educating – with powerful automated advice technology – which codifies the logic of how much to invest, into what products and which portfolios. Coaches are the key point of contact for clients and use our technology to build a cash flow forecast around their financial goals. Then, our advice engine translates the forecast (as well as risk profile, capacity for loss and other assessments) into specific, personal investment actions.
Our holistic advice technology has been developed alongside financial advisers, with decades of practical experience serving clients, to ensure it’s fit for purpose. And the suitability reports it generates are reviewed and checked for quality.
As a firm offering restricted advice, we also help save time and money by making recommendations from a range of products (ISA, SIPP and GIA) and portfolios, which we manage on the Octopus Money platform.
There are obviously many personal circumstances that an algorithm isn’t well equipped to deal with. But we find this methodology is really well suited to individuals with simpler financial circumstances and enables them to get access to 1-to-1 advice in a new, more affordable way – without losing access to a dedicated person who can guide them on the path to their financial goals.
Can you tell me more about your coaches?
We’re proud to be creating new career pathways into advice. Over the past few years, we’ve trained and accredited a diverse group of financial coaches who are passionate about helping clients and closing the advice gap.
We start by running a highly selective application process, in which less than 5% of applicants are selected to join our training programme. We look for individuals with high EQ and exceptional communication skills, as well as strong financial literacy. Our training and certification programme includes a mix of theory and practical experience – and was the first of its kind to be independently accredited by The London Institute of Banking & Finance (LIBF). Every coach must pass a final assessment to receive their accreditation with Octopus.
We also have an industry-leading approach to ongoing quality assurance. Every client call is recorded, we have a dedicated team to monitor and review calls and we consistently ask for detailed feedback from our clients.
My clients are used to meeting with their adviser face-to-face. How do you hold sessions with clients?
At Octopus Money, clients meet with us virtually, via video chat, at times that suit them best. We find that most clients actually prefer the ease and flexibility of this set-up. But when we’re kicking off a new relationship, we’re always open to discussing other options – whether that’s inviting clients to meet us at our London offices or joining you for a day in your offices. At the end of the day, the most important thing is for clients to build a relationship with a friendly and dedicated expert they can trust.
Is there a minimum number of clients you’d be interested in acquiring?
If you have 50 or more clients who could be served by Octopus Money, it’s a good fit. Ideally, the average client would have have around £75,000 invested. (And we’re not best placed for clients with small balances in drawdown.) Where you have large books of clients, we’re happy to work with you on a tranche based approach.
How do you price a book of clients, and how long does it take?
We ask you for some basic information including age, level of assets, policy type, platform, the ongoing advice charge and whether they’re in drawdown. Our commercial team aims to come back with a price within 48 hours. That price will be a multiple of the ongoing advice fee you charge. We can move pretty quickly, pricing and completing a deal within 4 weeks.
What is the client onboarding experience?
We’ll work closely with you to create a brilliant first introduction to Octopus Money. Every client is unique, and we want them to feel excited about taking the next step in their financial journey with us. We’re happy to join joint handover calls, create bespoke content or video introductions and work with you on a coordinated written introduction. The clients’ first call will be with a coach who will take time to understand how they feel about money, their hopes and dreams, and to ensure the information we hold is correct. That will help us kick off the transfer advice process and direct clients to the right solutions for their needs.
Can you tell me more about the funds my clients will be invested in?
We offer a range of low cost, risk-rated portfolios that adopt a diversified approach to asset allocation and invest in predominantly passive funds. The portfolios have been designed to track the performance of the world’s major stock markets and offer exceptional value to customers while aligning to their risk appetite. As a DFM, we manage and rebalance customers’ portfolios as necessary.
You can view our portfolio fact sheets below.
We’re acquiring firms regularly and accruing smaller clients on an ongoing basis. How can you help us?
We’d be happy to work with advice firms pre-acquisition to triage clients so that they can come directly to Octopus Money – rather than being moved to your firm, and then disturbed again shortly after.
Can you help with preparing some due diligence on Octopus Money?
We’ve got you covered.
Here’s a link to a 1-pager you can use that covers why you can trust us as a home for your clients. And here’s a more detailed due diligence document should you need more information.
*Octopus as at 31 December 2023 – Funds Under Management data includes undrawn commitments, funds under advisory mandates and funds monitored. It also includes funds under the management of Octopus Renewables Limited
**Based on serving 100 clients investing £300k in place of 100 clients investing £75k (assuming a 0.75% advice fee)
