What changes
This is where the time comes back. Using the task list from Move 1 and the routines from Move 2, you move the preparation and paperwork behind each client to AI, one task at a time. Typical first candidates are meeting and file notes, review packs, first drafts of suitability reports, provider letters and replies to routine client emails.
The investment process moves too. AI can monitor portfolios against each client’s agreed goals and risk, flag drift, compare funds and draft the rationale for a rebalance, more quickly and consistently than a person working through spreadsheets. The adviser’s job shifts to the parts clients value most: agreeing the goals, keeping clients on course when markets or life get difficult, and standing behind the recommendation. The firm stays responsible for suitability, so every handed-over task keeps a named person who checks it. Nothing reaches a client, or a client file, until someone qualified has read it.
Why it matters now
Clients still want a person for the big decisions, and that is likely to hold for years. What they are less willing to pay for is time spent behind the scenes. If the legwork stays manual while the tools improve, the firm carries a cost that others have removed. Handing it over also creates the capacity Move 5 needs: you can’t serve more households on a subscription if each one still takes a day of paperwork a year.
Checked AI output can improve the file as well. A consistent meeting note written the same day is easier to evidence under the Consumer Duty than a note typed up from memory a week later.
Checklist
- Pick the two or three tasks from your Move 1 list that take the most hours and carry the least judgement. For most firms that means file notes and review preparation.
- Write a checking step for each task: who reviews the output, what they check it against, and where the check is recorded on the client file.
- Run old and new side by side for a month on a small group of clients before switching fully, and compare the results.
- Get client consent for meeting recording and transcription, and update your privacy notice to describe how the firm uses AI.
- Record the hours saved each month so you know how much capacity you have when you reach Move 5.
Illustrative example
A firm with 200 ongoing clients used to spend about 3 hours of paraplanner time preparing each annual review pack. With AI drafting the pack from platform data and last year’s notes, and a paraplanner checking it, the time falls to about 1 hour. That saves 2 hours per client, or 400 hours a year.
File notes follow. The firm holds around 300 client meetings a year, and each note used to take 30 minutes. Transcribed and drafted by AI, then checked by the adviser, each takes about 10 minutes. That’s 20 minutes saved per meeting, or 100 hours a year. Together, the two changes free about 500 hours, which the firm puts into more frequent contact with clients approaching retirement.
Common mistakes
- Automating without a checker. AI output reads confidently even when it is wrong. Build a named reviewer into the process from day one and record every check.
- Starting with suitability reports. They matter most, so start with notes and review packs, build confidence in the checking routine, then move to reports.
- Letting saved hours disappear. If you don’t decide where the time goes, it gets absorbed by email and ad hoc requests. Plan its use before you start.
Coaching your clients
Many of your clients are going through the same change at work. Some are finding their roles reshaped by AI, and some are wondering whether their career plans still hold. Use the review meeting to ask about it directly. A client whose income is less certain may need a larger cash buffer, a revised retirement date or a fresh look at their protection cover. Being open about how your own firm uses AI, and how you check it, also gives them a practical model they can use in their own work.