IFA Profile - Mike Godfrey
Great validation for FP Advance and its work, as one of our clients wins yet another award for his business.
Mike Godfrey
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Mike is Managing Director of FS3.
What makes a good Corporate Adviser? Be commercial and profit orientated but act with integrity, honesty and professionalism at all times. If it were your money, would you do it? Best career moment? Setting up FS3 and taking control of my destiny. On the individual side, the firm has around 100 core personal financial planning clients tiered into gold, silver and bronze accounts. Assets under management now stand around the £60m mark and the company uses the James Hay wrap to consolidate portfolios. |
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Interests outside work?
My hobbies are sailing, watching rugby, keeping fit, occasionally completing a personal challenge to raise money for charity.
Congratulations to FP Advance client Mike Godfrey of FS3 on winning New Model Adviser of the Year Award 2007 (Southeast) for the second year running.
Mike heads a fantastic business, as many advisers will already know. The work done on refining the client segmentation, developing clear and appropriate service standards, and having a transparent pricing strategy have all played a role in increasing turnover and recurring income by 40% over the last 12 months. The number of Gold clients has also increased by 300% during that time, increasing profitability dramatically.
This award has helped to raise the profile of the business and has had some great media coverage in Corporate Adviser.
Download: Corporate Adviser Article Feb 2007 - size 6.3MB
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We also have a video interview with Mike conducted by Brett Davidson, Chief Executive of FP Advance as well as a case study outlining the work FP Advance did with FS3. Download: FS3 Case Study PDF - size 598KB |
Case Study
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Walsham Brothers is a leading City of London based specialist reinsurance broker. It used to operate a defined benefit pension scheme with around 110 members where the split between actives and deferreds was about one-third to two thirds. “Every time we received the triennial valuation it appeared that a spiralling amount of cash was needed to look after the arrangement,” explains Brian Gordon, Walsham’s finance director. “So we wanted to examine our options.” Gordon says Walshams was keen to provide staff with a retirement arrangement but, as with many final salary arrangements up and down the UK, there was a need to clamp down on worsening liabilities too. “You don’t want to just leave a blank cheque on the table.” One of Walsham’s directors was already a personal client of FS3. So Godfrey was called in to see what he could advise. “We wanted to create a new arrangement which included a reasonable spread of investment funds and which allowed the employees to monitor how their entitlements were performing,” Gordon explains. After coming up with a choice of options, Godfrey helped Walshams to set up a group personal pension from Friends Provident. Once the plan was created it was then a case of communicating to staff how the new arrangement worked. “Mike came in and did some workshops with the staff and I am glad to say the new scheme is doing just what it said it would on the tin,” says Gordon. As featured in the Corporate Adviser Feb 2007 |
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Related Content
Download: FS3 Case Study PDF - size 598KB
Download: Corporate Adviser Article Feb 2007 - size 6.3MB
