Financial Checklist

We understand you’re busy and sometimes your personal finances can take a back seat, but taking a few simple steps now could make a world of difference in the future.

Is your money working as tax-efficiently as it could be? Are you looking after your family’s financial future? Will you have enough for the retirement you want? Find out in our 10-minute checklist below.

Managing your money now

❏ Are you using your full ISA allowance?
Each year you can put £20k into ISAs – either cash, stocks and shares or a mixture of both – and any interest or growth will be exempt from tax. It is a use it or lose it allowance though, so make sure you do!

❏ Have you used your full pension allowance?
Each year you can put up to £40k of gross contributions into your pension pot and benefit from tax relief on it, at your highest marginal rate. For those earning above £100,000 per year, this could be as much as 61% in tax relief, meaning that adding £1,000 to your pension may only cost you around £390 in cash terms.

❏ Are you making the most of other tax allowances you have available?
For instance, you may have a Capital Gains Tax exemption available and an annual tax-free dividend allowance too.

❏ Do you have other investments? If so, are you confident that they match your own personal risk profile?
Too little risk may be as damaging to your future as too much risk. Are they well-diversified across different sectors?

Planning for your family's future

❏ Do you have a will in place?
Often overlooked by busy professionals, getting it done can be a weight off the mind and ensure the security of your family.

❏ If you have children, do you have Junior ISAs (JISAs) in place for them?
You can invest up to £9k per child each year into JISAs and, just like adult ISAs, the returns are free of tax. Between ages 16 and 18, they can pay into an adult ISA too, meaning an allowance of up to £29k per child for those two years. This could help set them up financially for their adult years.

❏ Do you have plans in place for paying school fees?
Private school boarding fees cost on average £35,300 per school year. If other family members are keen to help, setting up a trust may offer them a tax-efficient way of doing so.

❏ What protection do you have in place?
Being a partner often means you’re self-employed. Does that mean you’re missing out on benefits packages, such as income protection, or death in service? Having these, and other protection and insurance policies in place could help your family should the worst happen.

Planning for your retirement and later years

❏ Are you using your inheritance tax gifting allowance?
You can give away a total of £3,000 worth of gifts each tax year without them being added to the value of your estate for inheritance tax purposes. This is known as your ‘annual exemption’. You can carry any unused annual exemption forward to the next tax year - but only for one tax year.

❏ What fees are you paying on your pension?
If you’ve built up a number of pension pots, the fees you’re paying for their management are likely to be very different. Consolidating them into one may be an option.

❏ Are you likely to exceed the pensions lifetime allowance?
Currently, you can save just over £1m into pensions.

❏ How are your pensions performing?
Are you on track to have the retirement and lifestyle you want when you step back from working? A cash flow planning tool can help calculate this quickly and easily.