The Paraplanners' Assembly Podcast

In this month’s Self-Assembly podcast, host Sam Tonks is joined by Julie South and Steven McBurnie to chat about CPD that’s hiding in plain sight, providers WHO WON’T PICK UP THE PHONE, smart glasses, meeting recording, clients who run their suitability report through AI assistants, and ask ‘When is a 'fun fact' a fact?’.

Resources, events and interesting things mentioned during this episode.

CISI Financial Planning Conference 2026

CISI Scotland Compliance & Operations Conference 2026

Lang cat HomeGame 6

Women's Wealth Alliance Career Guide

Financial Planner Life podcast

Silo (on Apple TV)

And the winner is...paraplanning (podcast episode)

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Years of frozen allowances have resulted in more and more clients feeling the effect of fiscal drag – when more of your wealth becomes vulnerable to tax.

So understanding fiscal drag and what its effects mean for clients, is a really important feature of day-to-day paraplanning.

That's why we invited Utmost International's technical sales manager, Steve Sayer, to share his thoughts on fiscal drag and how paraplanners can consider addressing it.

Steve explains how, for instance, allowances have lost real value and the capital gains tax exemption has shrunk. And how the frozen nil rate band means more estates than ever are being pulled into inheritance tax.

But in this in-depth technical session – which features a case study example along the way – Steve illustrates how the careful application of planning strategies using trusts, and onshore and offshore bonds, mean the negative consequences of fiscal drag needn’t be inevitable.

Over the years, Steve has created a series of technical Assemblies that have become some of the most popular episodes we have published among paraplanners. Tune in now and find out why.

Download: Steve's slides on Fiscal Drag

Utmost Technical Academy webinar series

Utmost x Paraplanners' Assembly: all our previous sessions

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We all have pension questions we’ve never quite got round to asking. Maybe the moment wasn’t right. Maybe the right expertise wasn’t around. Maybe you just didn’t want to be the one to ask.

That’s why in this Assembly, we staged a pension intervention. Because host Richard Allum posed the most pressing pension-related questions to someone who just loves answering them: Quilter’s retirement and pension technical specialist, Adam Cole.

Over one lunch hour, we worked our way through pension topics that either crop up regularly in client cases or maybe just leave you scratching your head from time to time. Things like:

• Transitional tax-free cash, lump sum allowances and lump sum death benefit allowances
• Taking tax-free cash after 75 and the implications
• Taking protected tax-free cash and moving into drawdown
• How defined benefit pensions work
• Guaranteed annuity rates, guaranteed cash sums and other features of older-style contracts

Watch or listen now to brush up on your pension knowledge. And don’t forget to follow the link below to download your certificate for CPD.

Download: Grab your CPD for this Assembly

Transitional regime for past crystallisations

Trusts: Brush up on the essentials in one hour

Transitional tax-free amount certificate (TTFAC)

ILSA, ILSDBA and permitted maximums

ILSA, ILSDBA and permitted maximums grid of protections

Transitional regime calculator

Block transfers

Normal minimum pension age: changes coming in 2028

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What actually goes into the total cost a client pays for their platform? That’s the question that this episode sets out to answer.

And to do it host Richard Allum is joined by Transact CEO, Tom Dunbar, who covers the four components that contribute to charges: the annual platform charge, wrapper fees, brokerage fees, and any cash interest retention.

Along the way Richard and Tom explore how annual charges are typically tiered, why family linking can make a real difference for smaller portfolios, how wrapper fees scale with the complexity of the product, and where brokerage fees do (and don’t) add up.

Finally, the conversation turns to the issue of cash interest retention – the gap between what a platform earns on client cash and what it pays out – and how it differs from platform to platform. 

Tom explains why Transact has taken a firm stance on the issue, and why retention of interest plus ‘double dipping’ and ‘triple dipping’ have become a focus for the FCA.

Transact's website

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You'd be forgiven for thinking that a gathering of previous award winners could turn into a smugfest.

But it’s PARAPLANNERS that we’re talking about.

So this episode – recorded specially to mark the tenth annual Professional Paraplanner Awards – is far from self-congratulatory. In fact, it's packed with thinking that will inspire every paraplanner wherever you are in your career.

Why? Because it illustrates how entering an award – or even just thinking about it – is one of the most helpful ways to reflect on your career, what you’ve achieved and what you would like to achieve in the future.

Host Caroline Stuart of Sparrow Solutions is joined by Natalie Dawes, editor of Professional Paraplanner, along with three paraplanners who've been through the process themselves: Hannah Hirons of Navigatus, Luke Sparkes of Sparkes Paraplanning, and Hannah Wynick of Core Financial Paraplanning.

In an hour-long chat they talk about:

• overcoming your imposter syndrome
• why nominating yourself is OK even when it might not feel like it
• why being nominated by someone else feels ACE
• whether there’s a difference entering awards when you’re in-house versus outsourced
• why writing an award entry helps you realise what you're actually good at
• what it's like to sit in an interview with judges – and why it’s so valuable

What’s more, the conversation also recognises that some people just don’t want to enter awards or feel the need to do so and explores ways in which paraplanners can receive the recognition their work deserves.

Above all, this is an episode that shows how powerful it can be for paraplanning practitioners to reflect on their professional progress. And how the peer-led evaluation of entries has established the Professional Paraplanner Awards as the preeminent standard for the paraplanning profession.

The Professional Paraplanner Awards 2026 shortlist

Visit the episode page at the Assembly website

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The rules are changing and from April 2027 unspent pension pots will fall within the scope of inheritance tax. Draft legislation is now published, and there’s plenty for paraplanners to get to grips with.

This Assembly looks at how we got here, and where we need to go with less than nine months to go. We looked at what the May 2026 HMRC technical note and draft legislation actually confirmed, what it means in practice, and, what it means for the planning advice paraplanners are helping to shape right now.

Host Richard Allum is joined by guest Mark Devlin, Senior Technical Manager at M&G, to practically address some of the trickier questions the changes raise.

Together, they covered:

• The background: how we got here, and what the consultation process did and didn’t address
• Discretionary vs directed schemes: a refresher on the distinction and why it matters for IHT treatment
• How the new process will work in practice, including the role of personal representatives
• Planning implications: is it still worth funding a pension, and at what level?
• Balancing pension use for retirement income against IHT exposure, and keeping an eye on taxable funds for beneficiaries
• A common income tax misconception, and why some recent press coverage has muddied the water

At the end of this Assembly, you’ll have a better understanding of the confirmed changes, a better grasp of the planning considerations that flow from them, and some practical frameworks to bring to your paraplanning work, whether you’re reviewing existing pension strategies or helping to shape new ones.

Here are the links you need from this event.

CPD: Request your certificate

Slides: Pensions and IHT for Paraplanners' Assembly - 1 Jul 2026

Watch at Crowdcast (with chat)

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We got together online at 1pm on Wed 17 June 2026 for The Self-Assembly Paraplanning Show.

Why 'Self-Assembly'? Because host Sam Tonks and guests Alan Gow, Jackie Manning and Kimberley Malin started out with four talking points to cover in one lunch-hour. The topics were

– how the paraplanning year has gone so far

– what's coming up for paraplanners

– what could be a thing but isn't yet, and

– what events and resources they're recommending right now

The result is a wide-ranging conversation that takes in mixed feelings about AI (it's handy for handover emails, but when it's confidently wrong..?), chat about rising role of annuities and gifting from excess income, plus questions about the decline of cash, what advice might look like in the future if so-called 'finfluencers' are allowed to continue to 'finfluence'.

Fancy tuning in? Then listen now.

There were loads of useful links shared of the course of the lunch hour. Here are the ones we managed to note down.

Watch the Replay in Crowdcast (includes chat)

Find out more about the PFS Paraplanning Panel

PFS Paraplanning resources

PFS Festival of Financial Planning

CISI Paraplanner Interest Group

Estate Research: Good webinars and resources

M&G Trusts School

Professional Paraplanner Technical Insight Seminars

The Financial Planning Club

Kings College London: Consumer Duty in the Age of AI & Sustainability

What If?... A Guide To Working Smart & Building Your Own Path In Paraplanning

Sign up for the Lang Cat newsletter

Squiggly Careers

Open AI Academy

Think Fast, Talk Smart: The Podcast

Podcasts from Adam Grant

The Private Eye podcast

Books from Freida Mcfadden

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Setting up your own outsourced paraplanning business can be an exciting prospect but going into it with your eyes open and with the benefit of other people’s hard-won experience makes for a much stronger start.

This Assembly brings together three paraplanners who’ve recently done exactly that, for an honest conversation about what it’s really like.

Join us online at 1.00 pm on Wednesday 3 June for an honest, practical conversation about what it really takes to start an outsourced paraplanning business.

Host Richard Allum is joined by three paraplanners who’ve recently done exactly that: Jawaad Tanwir founder of ParaplanX, Ellie Bailey founder of Paraflo, and Phillip Williams of Beyond Paraplanning (and author of ‘What If?…: A Guide To Working Smart & Building Your Own Path In Paraplanning‘).

Together they’ll reflect on their own experiences and share what they’ve learned, covering:

• what the outsourced paraplanning market looks like right now, and whether it’s a good time to be thinking about this
• the questions worth asking yourself before you take the leap and how to know if it’s genuinely what you want
• how to go about setting up an outsourced business in practice
• what they wish they’d known at the start, and what they’re still figuring out
• how they’re finding balance in work, in business, and beyond

You’ll leave with a clearer picture of what outsourced paraplanning business life actually looks like including the opportunity, the reality, and the things worth thinking through before you commit. Whether you’re seriously considering it or just curious, this is an opportunity to hear from people who’ve been exactly where you are.

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Host Leanne Pickering from Pivotal Paraplanning is joined by James Jones-Tinsley, self-invested pensions technical specialist at Barnett Waddingham, to catch up on what's been happening in Parliament and politics and what it means in practice for paraplanners and their clients.

They cover the:

• local election results
• state opening of Parliament
• new Enhancing Financial Services Bill
• Pension Schemes Act 2026 and the salary sacrifice changes due in April 2029; and
• HMRC technical note on IHT and pensions – including what's still unclear and why that's causing real headaches for estates that need to be settled within six months of death.

There's also a discussion about what a change in Labour leadership might mean for the pensions landscape, and whether the IHT on pensions rules could yet change before April 2027.

If you've been keeping one eye on the news and another on a client's estate plan, this one's well worth your time.

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Trusts used to be the kind of thing you’d come across every now and again. Something to dust off the knowledge for, handle carefully, then put back on the shelf.

That’s changing. With pension IHT changes on the horizon, trust planning is becoming a regular fixture on paraplanners’ desks and the paraplanners best placed to support their clients will be the ones who can approach it with genuine confidence, not just familiarity.

This Assembly is designed to help you get there.

This practical Assembly takes you from the foundations right through to real-world trust planning decisions.

Shaun Moore, Tax and Financial Planning Expert at Quilter, joins host Richard Allum for this Assembly. Together they work through the essentials and the less obvious bits that every paraplanner working with trusts needs to have at their fingertips.

During this Assembly, we:

• explore why trust planning has moved from the occasional to the everyday, and why the pension IHT changes expected from April 2027 are likely to accelerate that further
• get to grips with the types of trust you’re most likely to encounter (loan trusts, discounted gift trusts and reversionary interest trusts) and how to tell them apart when different providers call them different things
• use the three circles of access, flexibility and tax efficiency as a practical framework for matching the right trust to the right client
• explore the common mistakes and questions that come up again and again
• understand the ongoing practical obligations that come with trusts, from the Trust Registration Service to trustee bank accounts, and when a professional trustee makes sense

You’ll leave with a clearer, more confident grasp of trust planning, not just the theory, but the practical judgement to apply it. Whether you’re doing in-depth trust research or writing up recommendations that involve one, this session gives you a framework and a reference point you can keep coming back to.

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