Cost of Financial Planning advice

Some financial planners say that they need to spend 40 hours to gather information and give suitable advice to the customer. They need to charge $500 to $1,000 for this advice. This is expensive.

If doctors spend 40 hours to gather information about a patient and give suitable treatment, it will also cost just as much to see a doctor. But the doctor (i.e. general practitioner) has found a way to reduce the time taken, so that the information gathering and treatment can be done within 15 minutes. The doctor charges around $30 for consultancy. Read this report about what the doctor has to know and practice.

It should be possible for a financial planner to reduce the time that is needed to give advice. Some of the steps are:

a) Give a booklet to the consumer to read on their own, and understand the basics
b) Ask the consumer to provide the details in a form
c) The financial adviser has a preliminary discussion with the consumer
d) The financial adviser takes some time to prepare the analysis
e) The financial adviser presents the recommendation in a separate visit

If this is done using a more efficient approach, the time taken can be reduced to between 2 to 4 hours. This will reduce the cost of financial planning advice by 90%. Maybe a fee of $100 to $200 will be sufficient.