Referring the client who's just had a windfall

A windfall, whether an inheritance, a business sale, a large bonus, a lottery of circumstance or a compensation payout, arrives with no plan attached. Left alone, it tends to drift: into a low-interest account for years, into hasty spending, or into an investment chosen on a tip rather than on suitability. You are frequently the first person the client tells, and often the only one positioned to say, before the money settles into bad habits, that this deserves proper planning.

As a SmartPeer member you are the introducer, not the adviser. You are not telling the client where to put the money. You are the trusted professional who can see a significant sum needs a considered plan and who can connect the client to a vetted, regulated advice firm while the decision is still open and the reliefs still available.

Windfalls come in several forms, and each is a clear cue to introduce a specialist:

• An inheritance that lands with no plan and possibly its own tax considerations.
• Proceeds from selling a business or a property that now need investing and a purpose.
• A large bonus, share vesting or unexpected payout that the client has not decided how to use.
• A compensation or insurance settlement that must last and be handled sensibly.
• Any lump sum the client is tempted to leave in cash indefinitely for want of a plan.

In every case the client benefits from regulated advice on what the money should do, and from getting it before habit or haste decides for them.

The distinctive feature of a windfall is that timing matters. The longer a large sum sits unplanned, the more likely it is to be eroded, mis-deployed, or to miss a planning window. Your value is partly in prompting the client to act before that happens. But the temptation, when someone asks what they should do with a sudden fortune, is to offer a view, and that view would be regulated advice.

Whether a particular investment or plan is suitable is not yours to say. Your job is to move quickly to the right introduction, not to answer the question yourself. Keeping to that line protects you and, in truth, serves the client better: a considered plan from a regulated firm will always beat an accountant's off-the-cuff suggestion, however well meant.

SmartPeer keeps your part light and quick, which is exactly what a windfall calls for. You identify the moment, introduce the client to a vetted, regulated advice firm, and let the specialist take the planning forward. You are not managing the money or approving recommendations. Your role is the introduction and a follow-up to confirm your client was well looked after.

Because SmartPeer is commission-only, introductions cost you nothing, and members typically receive a 60-70% share of the fee when an introduction leads to business. With a windfall the sums involved can be significant, so a prompt, well-judged introduction serves the client and rewards the practice at the same time.

The framing should encourage the client to act while leaving the decisions to the specialist. You might say that a sum this size is a decision waiting to be made, that leaving it in cash is itself a choice with a cost, and that you know a regulated firm who will help them plan it properly. Then you offer to make the introduction now rather than later.

That keeps you firmly as the introducer. You have not advised on where the money should go or judged what is suitable; you have flagged that the moment matters and connected your client to the right people to seize it. Clients who handle a windfall well remember who nudged them to plan rather than drift, and that gratitude has a way of returning as referrals of its own.

When a windfall crosses your desk, treat the introduction as time-sensitive. A quick, considered handover there is one of the clearest demonstrations of why referral belongs in a modern practice.