About Sterling & Law

Our story

⟦Founding year and history to be confirmed.⟧ Sterling & Law advises individuals and families on financial planning, investments, pensions, retirement, inheritance tax and estate planning.

Why the firm was set up this way

The practice was built around a small number of connected areas where the work is genuinely technical and where the outcome usually turns on getting the structure right early rather than on being clever later. That is a deliberately narrow proposition. It means turning work away, and it means being willing to say that a question does not need paid advice at all.

Independent, and paid by you

Advice here is independent: across the whole of the relevant market, not a restricted panel, and paid for by the client rather than by a product provider. The fee is set out in writing before any work starts, and the ongoing charge states what it buys. If you cannot tell what you are paying and for what, something has gone wrong — here or anywhere else you take advice.

Six areas, and the edges of them

Financial planning, investments, pensions, retirement planning, inheritance tax and estate planning. The edges matter as much as the areas: will drafting, trust deeds and powers of attorney are legal work and are referred to a solicitor; tax returns are an accountant’s. We coordinate with them rather than pretending the line is not there.

What we will not do

We do not recommend what we would not hold. We do not present a projection as a prediction. We do not describe an arrangement as having no downside when what it costs is access to your own money. And we do not claim a regulatory status we do not hold — which is why this site states its permissions plainly and will state the firm reference number once it is confirmed.

The firm

The people behind it

⟦Biography to be supplied. Anything stated here about qualifications, designations or regulatory status must be verifiable: chartered and certified titles are protected, and an adviser’s status can be checked by anyone on the FCA register in under a minute.⟧

⟦Where a firm has more than one adviser, list them here with their own permissions rather than describing the firm in the singular.⟧

⟦Name⟧ ⟦Role⟧ ⟦Qualifications and regulatory status to be confirmed — see note below⟧

The areas we work across

Financial planning Independent, whole-of-market advice built around what the money is for.
Investments Portfolio construction and ongoing management, with total cost stated in full.
Pensions Arrangements found, costed and consolidated only where it genuinely helps.
Retirement planning Sustainable income, tested against poor sequences rather than averages.
Inheritance tax The liability quantified before any solution is discussed.
Estate planning Documents and nominations coordinated so they say the same thing.

Background

⟦Role⟧ ⟦Dates⟧ ⟦Experience to be supplied.⟧
⟦Earlier role⟧ ⟦Dates⟧ ⟦Experience to be supplied.⟧

Qualifications and regulatory permissions are published once confirmed, and can be checked independently on the FCA register. We would rather this section stayed empty than carried anything that could not be verified.

What we stand for

Three things we will not trade away

Every advice firm says it is independent, transparent and client-focused. These are the three we are willing to be judged on, because each one costs us something.

01

The whole cost, always

Every recommendation comes with the total cost of ownership, including the layers a provider would not volunteer. Sometimes that makes our own charge look large next to a cheaper alternative. We show it anyway, because a client who cannot see what they are paying cannot judge whether it is worth it.

02

Advice you can disagree with

Recommendations come in writing, with the reasoning and the options we rejected. That makes them easier to challenge, which is the point. A recommendation that cannot be interrogated is a sale.

03

Saying when you do not need us

If an existing arrangement is reasonable, or the question does not need paid advice, we say so. This costs us fees and it is the single clearest test of whether a firm is working for the client or for its own revenue.

How the firm is put together

Small on purpose

Your adviser is the person who does the work

You deal with the person who writes your plan, not a relationship manager who passes it on. The work is not handed down to whoever is free.

Six areas, not sixty

A narrow range means the people advising on pensions actually spend their time on pensions. Where a question falls outside it, we say so rather than improvising.

We hold no client money

Investments are held with regulated providers and custodians in your own name. ⟦Confirm the platform and custody arrangements, and the protections that apply, before publication.⟧

Reviews that test the plan

An annual review compares the plan to what actually happened — contributions missed, spending drifted, markets that did something other than the assumption. Restating the plan is not a review.

Responsibility

The obligations that come with the work

Advising on money carries duties that run past the individual client — to the regulator, to the people who rely on the advice indirectly, and to anyone who might read a recommendation years later and need to understand the reasoning. We take those seriously as a matter of practice rather than policy.

⟦Pro bono or community commitment to be confirmed, if the firm makes one. Better to say nothing than to claim something unspecific.⟧

Tell us what you are trying to work out

A first conversation at our cost, and an honest view on whether advice would change anything for you.

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