So how do you tell if we can offer independent advice?                                               For an adviser to be allowed to call themselves independent for advising on any product they must: offer advice on the whole of the market and offer the ability to pay by fee. Different types of advisers will offer you different payment options. 

Typically, the three ways you can pay for an adviser's services are

1. Pay an agreed fee and all the commission earned will either go to you or enhance the plan.                                                                                                                    2. Pay no fee and and the commission is paid to the adviser.                                     3. Pay an agreed fee and the commission is paid to the adviser.                                                                                                                                                      For an adviser to be a independent you must be offered the choice to pay by fee and the commission returned to you. In addition an independent financial adviser can also offer you any of the other options available to give you more choice. It also pays to be aware that someone can call themselves an independent financial adviser but also offer products from one company. So it is prudent to ask the question, " Are you independent with regard to the product you are offering me" If they advise you that they are, review the fee payment options that they offer. If they do not give you the option to pay by fee only and return all commission to you, they are not an independent adviser                                                                                                                                                             Remember by seeking the advice of a specialist independent adviser you ensuring that you receive impartial, unbiased and appropriate advice that could save you thousands of pounds in the future

We at Pollard & Smiles Ltd have decided to offer an additional Multi Tie option to our financial advice process to allow our company to specialise in a selected panel of insurers for certain products. This does not distract from our company offering independent financial advice at the request of the client as we can go off panel if we feel its at the benefit of the client. Our company is classed as a hybrid firm.