Your proven pathway to a richer, more fulfilling financial future

Frequently Asked Questions

• What is 'financial life management'?

  Financial Life Management is traditional wealth advice reimagined. It’s where life meets your finances. Your future success isn’t just about products, picking investments or predicting markets. It’s about clearly understanding your definition of a successful life, and helping you achieve it.

  This comprehensive approach to your future life success is at the absolute heart of the transformation of an outdated traditional wealth management industry into a noble, helping profession, advocated by AES.

  Financial life management is not a one-size-fits-all approach. You get a highly personalised experience delivered by a team of leading experts supported by proprietary tools to ensure you get better results and achieve your ideal future.

• What is a fiduciary?

  Fiduciary, basically means trusted. Advice that's always in your best interest. You'll get the same sage advice as our family members. This sounds like common sense, but its practice is extremely uncommon.

  In fact, AES was the first and remains the only firm in the AMEA (Asia, the Middle East and Africa) region to meet this standard of excellence. That’s in a population of 5 billion+ people!

  Fiduciary service to our community underpins our transformative approach to 'traditional' financial services.

  Certified firms volunteer to be comprehensively assessed and audited by CEFEX®, The Centre for Fiduciary Excellence each year. Assessments are conducted to the principles of the international standard ISO 9000 and ISO 17021.  Certification helps determine the trustworthiness of investment fiduciaries.

  You can read the Prudent Practices for Investment Advisers here. 

• Can you give me an overview of your process?

  You'll start with a free 15-minute Discovery Call. Our objective is to learn about you; your goals and objectives; so we can understand IF and HOW we can help you. If we can’t help—we’ll do our best to point you in the direction of someone who can.

  If we both agree it’s a good fit, you’ll meet with a Financial Life Manager and have a Compelling Conversation. Together, you’ll discuss your vision, values, relationships, assets, and interests so we understand what matters to you most. You’ll likely discover some extremely valuable insights and learn about the advantages of choosing AES.

  Now comes the first decision—the time to make a commitment. We’ll formalise the relationship with a Client Agreement, introduce you to our team and then begin work on crafting your new Life Strategy/financial plan.

  Your Life Strategy lays out a detailed picture of your future and the things that are important to you. This is presented to you and refined along with your investment policy statement. If you wish to implement this strategy, you’ll then explore three areas; what foundations to build upon, what asset allocation you feel comfortable with, and which critical outcomes you need to build upon to enable you to live the ideal future you want.  

  Finally, we’ll now organise your account paperwork, confirm you’re comfortable with the relationship, and address any outstanding issues. To ensure you’re staying on track and meeting your goals, we’ll review your progress on a regular schedule and remain on call for anything you need in between. Life happens, so we’ll use these meetings to make any adjustments to your Life Strategy. We call this Truly Cared For. 

   

• Why do people work with AES?

  As the only CEFEX certified fiduciary within Asia, the Middle East and Africa, successful families hire us because they want wise counsel and trusted guides by their side. We help ensure you achieve 3 critical outcomes:

  • Wealth Mastery: Are you making the smartest decisions you can about your money and your future?
  • Wealth Security: Are you certain that you, and the people you care about most, are going to be OK—no matter what?
  • Wealth Enjoyment: Are you doing everything you want, when you want to, and are you living your best life?

• How are you different?

  We combine personal attention with a proprietary, proven and systematic approach to optimising your financial life. There are three core elements that define our difference:

  A Personalised Financial Plan

  We take the time to understand you—your goals, values, and preferred decision-making patterns or ‘money scripts’. From there, we collaboratively create a highly personalised Life Strategy or financial plan designed around your specific needs, helping get you better results through every stage of life.

  A Systematic Investing Philosophy

  Our investment approach is grounded in data, research, and decades of academic evidence. We don’t rely on speculation or trends—instead, we follow a structured, systematic process that prioritises consistency, transparency, and long-term success. You benefit from elegant simplicity, low costs, daily rebalancing and a Nobel prize-winning academic methodology to enable you to benefit wherever possible from higher expected returns. 

  Fiduciary, Service-Led Financial Life Management

  As fiduciaries, we’re legally and ethically bound to always act in your best interests. Our focus is on providing comprehensive guidance and support—not just managing investments but helping you make confident financial decisions that align with your life goals.

• What fees will I pay, and what services are included?

  You're charged a straightforward fee based on the assets managed on your behalf. This ensures our collective success.

  When you compare the charges from different financial advice firms it’s incredibly important you’re comparing like with like. You need to determine the right mix of charges and service to meet your needs.

  You need to understand how much you're paying, how you're paying it, and what level of service you're getting in return. This helps determine whether you're getting value.

  To help with this, AES offers an initial Compelling Conversation without charge or obligation. This allows us to get to know you and your needs better, explain our services, fee structure and your payment options, and to answer any questions you may have.

  In addition to our Terms of Business, you'll also be presented with a Client Agreement, which sets out the service to be provided and the associated fees. At this stage, you can decide whether you wish to go ahead. If you decide not to, no fees will be charged.

  Following your signed Client Agreement, service will begin. To ensure transparency, fees are reiterated again in your Investment Recommendation. There are typically two fees:

  Initial advice fee

  • Professional and personalised financial advice
  • Detailed situational assessment to inform your planning decisions
  • All necessary communications with you, your product providers, and your personal representatives as required
  • Comprehensive written financial Life Strategy
  • Implementation of recommended strategies
    
    

  Ongoing advice fee

  • Comprehensive regular reviews to cover the 9 domains of family wealth
  • Proactive monitoring of your investments, pensions, and other financial products
  • Access to your Financial Life Manager and support team by phone, email or face to face
  • Regular financial commentary and bulletins
  • Completion of all necessary administrative tasks
  • A trusted and expert financial guide who is on your side

   

  Initial fees are typically around £5,000 (or currency equivalent) depending upon the exact circumstances and your requirements, subject to a minimum of £1,995.

  Ongoing fees will be a maximum of 0.3125% per quarter and will decrease depending on the total value of the assets.

• Do I have enough money to become a client?

  Our unique service is best suited to those with portfolios or investable assets of at least £1m (≈ USD 1.3m, excluding property), and are ready to delegate to a team of expert, trusted professionals. We typically ask to advise upon all assets that are available for direct management so we can deliver advice that’s fully integrated across your financial life. 

  Many of our clients will have between £2 million and £20 million of assets under our care and some degree of complexity. Our Multi-Family Office Services start for those who hold in excess of £25 million.

  If you have advanced planning needs because your situation is more complex, we may instead recommend working together under a flat fee planning arrangement that reflects the scope of work involved. In those cases, a separate agreement would outline the services and cost.

  If we’re not the right fit, we’ll do our best to answer your questions and connect you with someone who might be.

• How do you justify your fee?

  Our fee reflects the value of having a trusted partner or 'Chief Financial Officer' focused on your entire financial life—so you don’t have to become your own adviser. We provide both quantifiable benefits (like investment or tax efficiency and withdrawal planning) and priceless peace of mind, empowering you to make confident, intentional decisions about retirement, lifestyle, and legacy. Ultimately, you’re investing in your time, clarity, and confidence—not just spreadsheets and returns.

• Does Sam personally oversee every client?

  No—Sam doesn’t personally oversee every client, but for every client the same high standard is maintained through our structured team approach. Each client is supported by a dedicated team including a lead adviser, service adviser, and client relationship manager—all trained through AES's internal programme to deliver a consistent, personalised experience rooted in our philosophy.

• Do you handle tax planning?

  All good financial life management is tax-led. At AES, we focus on proactive tax planning, not tax preparation. We help clients identify opportunities optimise their tax planning—all in coordination with your broader financial goals. While we are not tax specialists or advisers, we can collaborate closely with your own to ensure everything is implemented smoothly and strategically.

• Do you provide hourly or one-time project services?

  We specialise in helping globally minded, successful families who need (and want!) a long-term relationship. A proactive, ongoing service model allows us to continuously refine your retirement income, investment strategy, and tax plan as life changes. Because of this, we typically don’t offer one-time project services or hourly engagements. 

• Where do you hold my investments?

  For your security and convenience, investments may be held with a range of trusted custodians, which can include offshore private banks and investment platforms. 
  
  You can review your accounts at any time via the custodian’s portal or through the AESWealth client portal and app. We do not work for any custodian or receive commissions, so every recommendation we make is guided solely by our fiduciary responsibility to act in your best interests.