“It's been really helpful just having the roadmap to follow as we've gone through life”

Simon: This year, we both retired, which was part of the plan – what we wanted to do. We knew we needed a pension and to save, but we didn't know how much to save – what would be enough? And Neil helped us through that whole process. It's been really helpful just having the roadmap to follow as we've gone through life.

Nikki: With the fact that we’ve had 20 years’ experience of financial planning, it is maybe something that people of our age wouldn’t have been interested in then.

But I have to say, I think it's probably one of the best bits of financial advice that we took at that time. And now, 20 years later, we're seeing the rewards of it while we're still young enough to enjoy it.

Simon: At the end of the day, that whole planning process of following the roadmap allows you to know where you are and what actions you need to take if you're not going in the right direction. 

It's not about the product – that's just something that happens at the end. It's about what you want to achieve with your life; what are the things that you want to do; and what are the things that are important. 

If you've got no hope of making that happen, then they'll at least tell you, and you can decide what you need to do differently. Just sitting there hoping and then getting to 70 years old to find out that it didn't really work is not an option. You've only got one hit.