Writing financial planning letters clients can use

A financial planning letter may bring together recommendations, costs and conditions that a client needs time to consider. The adviser knows why each detail is there, but the client may be reading the explanation for the first time. Before concentrating on the wording, establish what the letter needs to help them understand or decide. That purpose should guide the opening and the order of the information.

In our training for financial adviser firms, we start with the difficulties a reader may encounter. A client may be unsure why the letter has arrived or whether they need to respond. They may understand the individual words while missing the connection between the advice and their next step. The techniques below give advisers a practical way to review those parts of the explanation.

Explain why you are writing

Different letters serve different purposes, even when they concern the same client and product. One may summarise a discussion, while another asks the client to decide whether to proceed. Establishing that distinction helps you choose an opening that the client can recognise. It also prevents a summary from sounding as though a decision has already been made.

For a letter summarising options discussed at a meeting, you could begin:

This letter gives a summary of the options that we discussed last Wednesday. If you want to discuss the options before making a decision, please phone or email me.

The opening explains both why the letter has arrived and how the client can get further help. The rest of the letter needs to follow the same account of the process. If the client has already made a decision, the opening would need to reflect that instead. Specific wording is useful only when it accurately describes the situation.

Use headings that tell the client what they will find

Once the purpose is clear, organise the information into sections the client can recognise. A heading such as “Notes” gives little help because it leaves the subject unstated. If the section explains the firm’s responsibilities, “Our responsibilities” tells the client what they will find. For a section about fee changes, “Fee increases this year” is more informative than “Important increase”.

These examples from our financial writing training show why headings need enough detail to describe their sections. Read the headings together after drafting the letter. They should give the client a useful outline and help them return to a particular question later. If a heading is difficult to write, check whether the section contains several subjects that need separating.

Review formal wording and technical terms separately

Financial writing contains specialist terms that a client may need explained. It also contains formal expressions that add difficulty without adding meaning. Reviewing these separately helps you make useful changes while preserving accuracy. For example, replacing “before commencing any work” with “before starting any work” is a different decision from replacing a defined product term.

Where a technical term matters, explain it in the context in which the client encounters it. They should be able to understand the surrounding recommendation without repeatedly leaving the letter to consult a glossary. If the term is unnecessary, consider whether a familiar expression explains the idea adequately. The responsible experts need to confirm that the revised wording retains the intended meaning.

Make the sequence and conditions clear

A letter can become difficult to follow when a sentence combines several stages of a process with the conditions applying to each. The client needs to understand what happens first and what must happen before the next step is possible. Work through that sequence before deciding where to divide the sentences or use a list. This preserves the relationship between the steps while making the explanation easier to follow.

Check the wording against the source after making those changes. A different tense can turn a possible event into one that appears confirmed. Likewise, removing a qualification can change the effect of a recommendation. The aim is to explain the process more clearly while keeping its conditions visible.

Explain the next step and make questions possible

Where the client needs to act, explain what to do and how to do it. Include a real deadline when one applies and explain the consequence of taking no action where it affects the decision. If no response is needed, explain what the firm will do next. This saves the client from searching for an instruction that the letter does not contain.

Use only dates and service commitments the responsible team has confirmed. “We contact you regularly” cannot become “every three months” simply because the revised version sounds more specific. Where a decision needs further discussion, make the support route clear before asking the client to commit. The explanation should give them room to understand the options without adding pressure the situation does not require.

Check how the letter is understood

A writer’s review can identify likely difficulties, but intended readers provide different evidence. Ask them to explain why the letter has arrived, what they need to do and what they expect to happen next. Compare those answers with the intended meaning. Where the answers differ, investigate whether the explanation is incomplete or the relationship between its parts is unclear.

The FCA’s March 2026 consumer understanding review discusses structure, timing and testing as parts of communication design. Our guide to testing financial documents explains how to investigate understanding in more detail. You can also see a short before-and-after insurance wording example.

How Narratology can help

We train financial adviser teams to apply plain language principles to the letters their clients need to read. Sessions use relevant documents and practical rewriting exercises, with attention to the decisions each communication supports. Contact Narratology about training for your team to discuss the material you are working on.

Source and further reading

Financial Conduct Authority: Consumer understanding: good practice and areas for improvement, 13 March 2026, sections 5 and 6.