What a financial coach actually does — and when you need one

Ask what you want to be holding at the end. If it is a decision about a product — which pension to consolidate into, whether to transfer, how much cover to take, where a lump sum should sit — you need a regulated adviser, and a coach cannot legally get you there. If it is clarity, order and follow-through — where the money goes, what the goals actually are, why the same three jobs never get done — that is coaching, and paying adviser fees for it is an expensive way to buy it. The awkward middle case is common: people book advice before they have anything to advise on, and get told so after paying for the meeting.

No, it is a different job at a different price. Initial regulated advice typically costs £1,500–£3,000, or 1–2% of the assets involved, because it carries regulatory liability, a suitability report and a continuing duty to you. Coaching here is £39 for a half-hour or £69 for a full hour, £399 for the Money Road Map, because nobody is taking responsibility for a product recommendation. Cheaper does not mean "do this instead". If you need a defined benefit transfer analysed, £39 is not a saving, it is the wrong service. If you need to know where your salary goes, adviser fees are not good value either.

Yes — general information, but never a recommendation. A coach can explain how tax relief works, what the auto-enrolment minimums are, how to trace a pension you have lost, and can model what happens to your projected pot if you contribute more. What a coach cannot do is tell you which scheme to use, which funds to hold, whether to transfer or consolidate, or when to start drawing. The line is the personal recommendation: "here is how this works, and here is your number" is coaching; "you should move it there" is advice. In practice, coaching first tends to make the advice conversation shorter and cheaper, because you arrive knowing what you are asking.

Because that is a personal recommendation dressed up as a favour, and it is exactly what the rules exist to prevent. An informal "if it were me" carries none of the protections a real recommendation comes with: no suitability assessment, no written reasoning, no ombudsman route if it goes badly. It also tends to be wrong, because whoever said it has not done the analysis. You will get a straight answer about what your figures say and what your options are, and you will get told which of them needs regulated advice. You will not get a steer on provider, product or fund, however the question is phrased.

No. Money coaching is not an FCA-regulated activity, and it is fair to know what that costs you. There is no Financial Ombudsman Service route and no FSCS protection over coaching, because there is no product and no regulated recommendation being made — those protections attach to advice, which is why product decisions are handed to Buzz Financial Services, the Buzz side of the relationship — your coach stays involved before, during and after any regulated advice. What you can check about us: Buzz Money Coach is a trading style of Buzz Money Ltd, registered in England and Wales, and every fee is published on this site. If something goes wrong, email hello@buzzaccounting.co.uk and a person deals with it; the route for data complaints is in our privacy notice.

Not for the internal hand-over, no. But be clear on the part that does involve money: if you go on to become a client of Equity & General, E&G pay us a commission — disclosed to you before the introduction, and you are free to say no. That removes the incentive that makes most referrals worth distrusting: we have nothing to gain from you needing advice, so "you do not need an adviser for this" is an answer we can give freely, and it is a frequent one. Buzz Financial Services is the other trading style of the same company, Buzz Money Ltd, so what you get from the connection is practical rather than financial — your fact-find travels with you, and you are not paying someone to gather the same information a second time.

Yes, and it is the arrangement that works best. Advice handles the product decisions — the pension, the investment, the cover, the mortgage. Coaching handles everything advice does not: the monthly surplus that funds any of it, the will that never gets written, the actions between annual reviews. Where an ongoing advice fee typically buys a review once a year, that is a long gap if your problem is momentum rather than asset allocation. Order matters too: doing the coaching first means you arrive at an adviser with a fact-find built, a clear surplus figure and written goals, which makes the advice quicker and usually cheaper.

Then it is neither of us. Free specialist debt advice from StepChange or National Debtline is the right first call and it is better than the paid alternatives — they negotiate with creditors, arrange debt management plans and advise on formal solutions such as IVAs and bankruptcy. A coach cannot advise on debt solutions, and neither can most financial advisers; it is a separate regulated activity. Be wary of anyone charging you to set up a debt plan the free services provide. Once the immediate pressure is gone, coaching is useful for the part a debt charity does not cover: making sure it does not happen a second time.