The Personal Finance Portal (PFP) is a revolutionary app that gives you access to view all your finances in one place 24/7 on any mobile or web device. PFP enables you to view your fund information and financial portfolio at the click of a button. So whether you're looking for an up-to-date valuation of your portfolio, want to assess how you're progressing against your goals or simply wish to get in touch, PFP has it covered.
On logging in to PFP, the first page you will see is the Dashboard:
Personal Finance Portal or PFP is an online portal where you can view your portfolio, send and receive secure messages between your adviser and upload & store documents in a secure document vault among other features.
What you see in PFP is a representation of data that your adviser has captured in their internal system, so any information you update in PFP will feed back to your adviser in real-time!
The term "Account" is used throughout the site and encompasses all financial items, with the exception of "Policies" - reserved for Protection - and "Property" which is an umbrella term used to describe the tangible, physical property. Your portfolio is split into Assets (5 account categories) and Liabilities (3 account categories). Protection is a stand-alone category. At the moment, these categories are fixed and cannot be altered.
For more information about your portfolio, navigate to the relevant section from the menu on the left-hand side of this guide.
A lot of the information you see is a summary and acts as a navigation point for you to click into for more information.
Arrows like this chevron_right allow you to drill down into that summary for more information.
Your PFP Dashboard puts you in control the moment you log in.
Your adviser details are always at the top of the screen. You can tap their number to call them from a phone device, or contact them via secure messaging by tapping 'Contact'. You can also log out or bring up the menu at any time using the buttons beside your own picture. If you haven't uploaded your picture yet you can do this from inside the 'Profile' section.
The different widgets give you an overview of your finances and communication with your adviser. If viewing on a desktop or laptop, you can drag and drop the widgets into the order that best suits your needs.
The dashboard widgets give you summaries on the following areas of PFP:
You can tap on the home icon in the header of any other page to get back to the dashboard home
The Assets tab shows your portfolio's valuation history in a time-series column graph with your net worth as the dotted line.
What is defined as an Asset & Liability?The table below the graph on the Assets tab shows the grouping of what is classified an Asset and what is classified a Liability, which is repeated here for your convenience:
AssetAn asset is a portfolio item which falls into one of the following categories;
LiabilityA liability is a portfolio item which falls into one of the following categories;
ProtectionProtection is not included in any of the calculations. No value figure will appear next to the Protection navigation banner.
What are the calculations?The Asset figure = the sum of the latest valuations across those accounts under the grouping of Assets.
The Liabilities figure = the sum of the latest valuations/outstanding balances across those accounts under the grouping Liabilities.
Your Net Worth is simply your Assets - Liabilities.
FiltersThe filters allow you to change the display of the time-series graph. Those filters are:
The grid below the graph is independent of the filters and will not update dynamically as the filters change. The Net Worth figure at the top left-hand side of the page can update dynamically based on the 'Account Categories' and 'View range' filters. It would display 'filtered' label next to the Net Worth figure if the filter is applied.
The last component 'View Full Financial X-Ray' is for information regarding the funds you invested in, see the Financial X-Ray section for more details.
Financial X-Ray is a tool to analyse the funds that you are invested in across your portfolio. Where fund analysis data is available this is provided by specialist third parties.
You can filter the primary graph by any combination of your Top 10 Investment Holdings, Owner, and view range (1 month to 3 years).
Asset Allocation:
Fund Fact Sheet - The fund fact sheets provide detailed information on most UK Unit Trusts and Open Ended Investment Companies (OEICs).The information you see is provided by the fund manager that gives an overview of the features of your investment funds.
Fund Performance (3 year fixed period) - shows the cumulative performance of the graph over the last 3 years.
Open Banking is a service that allows you to make your online banking data available to applications you use, such as Personal Finance Portal. In PFP this service is called 'linking an account'.
To do this you authenticate directly with your banking provider to give your permission for PFP to regularly import your bank account data. Open Banking is part of PSD2 (Payment Services Directive 2), which also requires providers of account integration services to be regulated by the FCA. Once you have linked your accounts to PFP the account balances will automatically be updated each day and account transactions will be categorized so that you can review your spending habits.
Support for savings accounts is limited depending on provider. Your provider will list any of your savings accounts which are supported as part of the process.
UK Account Provider | Current | Savings | Credit/Charge Card |
---|---|---|---|
Barclays | ✔ | ✔ | |
Barclaycard | ✔ | ||
Lloyds | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Bank of Scotland | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Halifax | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
MBNA | ✔ | ||
Nationwide | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Royal Bank of Scotland | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Natwest | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Santander | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
HSBC | ✔ | ✔ | |
First Direct | ✔ | ✔ | |
Marks and Spencer | ✔ | ✔ | |
Clydesdale Bank | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Monzo Bank | ✔ | ✔ | |
Tesco Bank | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
TSB Bank | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Virgin Money | ✔ | ✔ | ✔ |
Virgin Money Essential | ✔ | ||
Yorkshire Bank | ✔ | ||
Yorkshire Building Society | ✔ | ✔ | |
Chelsea Building Society | ✔ | ✔ |
*Updated December 2020
1. Go to 'Add New Account or Policy' page. You can navigate to it from the 'Assets' tab, 'Spending' tab, 'Linked Account' page or 'Assets & Liabilities' page in your Profile.
2. In the Providers table select the necessary Provider. Once clicked on it, you will be prompted to give a consent to access the following information from your provider: Account details, Account balances, Account transactions, Primary account number (which will be masked).
3. Once you give us consent, you will be redirected to your bank account's authorization page.
4. Then you should confirm to which accounts of this provider you allow access.
5. The confirmation message is shown if the accounts were added successfully.
Open Banking will request you to update your consent for the accounts every 90 days. Access to the accounts will be revoked automatically if you do not give a new consent. If you would like to revoke access before the 90 days expiry date please proceed with the following steps.
1. Click the 'Menu' button at the top.
2. Select 'Linked Accounts' menu.
3. Click 'Delete' button against the account you want to revoke access from.
The Spending tab is the central screen to review your income and expenditure.
You can select a category for a deeper dive into the Category view which shows:
You can select the chevron_right icon beside an individual transaction to re-categorize that transaction.
These are transactions that have been identified as being money moved between accounts. For that reason these transactions are not included in your income and expenditure totals.
Open Banking does not know if money has been moved between your linked accounts, so transfers may appear in any account (even if you have only linked one account).
An example of this would be your credit card payment being received in your credit card account. This is not income, even though it is an account credit, and would be marked as a transfer between accounts.
As with other transactions, you can re-categorize 'Transfer between accounts' type transactions if you wish. You can also re-categorize other transactions as transfers.
From the Spending tab you can access 'All Transactions'. This lists your account transactions and has lots of helpful filters to help you find specific transactions or groups of transactions.
In addition to the account filter you can also filter.
You can also choose to do a multiple re-categorization of some or all of the transactions you have grouped together on the screen - this can be useful if you identify, for example, a monthly outgoing that has been placed in another category multiple times.
Open Banking is totally secure and regulated by the FCA. Because you authenticate directly with your online provider, you never have to share your online credentials with any other third parties. Your account transaction data is only visible to you - your adviser can see your account balances but not your transaction data.
PFP does not support changing usernames at this point in time.
Changing your contact details (e.g. your email address) will not impact your username you use for PFP.
2FA is '2 Factor Authentication'. It is a security feature that requires you to authenticate your login with two different methods. It means that even if a third party acquires your PFP password they cannot access your account.
Before you set up 2FA, you will be periodically reminded to do so when logging in. You can either follow this link to set up 2FA or you can find the option to set up 2FA within the Security Settings area in the menu. The reminder looks like this:
To use 2FA in PFP you need an authenticator app. You can download one from your normal app store such as Google Authenticator or Microsoft Authenticator. Many authenticator apps are available so you can choose the one that best suits your requirements and needs.
When you click Get Started you will see a QR Code which you can scan into your chosen authenticator app:
Your authenticator app will then show you a code which you will need to enter in the Verification Code field before clicking Verify.
The codes that appear on the next screen are called "recovery codes". You will need to copy these to a safe place by clicking Copy to Clipboard. These codes are needed if you ever lose access to your authenticator. If you forget to make a note of these codes at this stage, you can also access the recovery codes within the Security Settings area, but note that you won't be able to access this area if you do not have your authenticator app.
After setting up 2FA, whenever you login in the future, you will be prompted to enter an additional one-time code. The code will be shown within your authenticator app.
If for any reason you would like to stop using the 2FA functionality after setting it up, you can find the option to do so within the Security Settings area.
Your Documents tab shows documents that you have uploaded.
Adviser Documents tab shows documents that your adviser and advice firm have uploaded for you.
You are entitled to 100MB of storage for "Your Documents". Any documents that your adviser has uploaded does not reduce your quota.
The current restrictions for uploading documents are:
Uploading a document is really simple!
By default, your document is not shared with your adviser.
However if you need to share this with your adviser, simply click the share button person_add and the document will be visible to your adviser.
Your adviser can view and download the document, but they cannot edit or delete it.
DocuSign is a really fast and convenient way for you to digitally sign documents that your adviser sends to you in PFP.
1. If your adviser requires you to sign a document using DocuSign you will receive a secure message.
2. The document will appear on the Documents widget (as shown below) and on the Adviser Documents page.
3. Clicking a DocuSign document for the first time will require you to agree to the DocuSign terms and conditions.
4. You will be required to add a digital signature on the initial set up.
5. You can choose an automatic signature, or you can draw a custom signature (Please note once you have adopted a signature, it cannot be changed).
6. Once the signature is adopted, it will appear on the document.
7. After signing the document click the 'Finish' button at the top. This will close the document and redirect you back to the Documents tab. Please wait for a couple of minutes until the signed document is available for downloading.
The Goals page is used to help you create goals and track their progress via the goal's linked account. The goals page is accessible via the Goals widget on the Dashboard or from the side menu.
To create a goal, simply press this button and add your goal details.
You will need at least 1 account to create a goal as PFP uses that account's balance to work out your goal progress.
The bar fill in the background indicates your account balance compared to your goal target amount.
Once you create a goal, you will be sent an insight to let you know of your goal progress and keep you focused on achieving your goal.
Once you have completed your goal, you will need to mark it as completed in PFP. This is done by:
You cannot un-complete a goal, so if you have completed a goal by accident, you will need to create a new goal
If you have completed a goal, you can Complete a goal in PFP instead of deleting it to keep it for your records.
The Expenditures on the Goals page show the total amount spent in each spending area in the last full calendar month, across all current accounts and savings accounts you have imported via Open Banking.
If you notice a particular spending area that you want to create a budget for, that will help you achieve your goals, simply click on the row of that spending area to...
Creating a budget
Simply press on the spending area you want to create a budget for.
How do I manage my budgets?
The icons on the right of a budget allow you to edit and delete them.
edit Edit - can be used when you want to alter the current monthly amount.
delete_forever Delete - when your budget is no longer relevant, you can delete that budget by pressing the Delete icon.
Your Profile is where you control your data. Your Profile is organised into sections and subsections that represent different aspects of your personal and financial information. You can visit Your Profile at any time to add data or maintain data as your circumstances change.
You can manage Your Profile for both you and your financial partner (such as a spouse), provided that you have consent from your partner to do so.
Where a section is shown in green with a tick, that means that the data in that section is complete.
Some sections feature a 'wizard' or 'carousel' which is a succession of questions on different screens. Each screen is represented by a dot at the bottom and a ticked one indicates that screen has been answered. If you need to complete a section then the un-ticked dots will show you which screens are outstanding.
About You
This is your personal details - name, date of birth, marital status etc. You can also upload your picture to personalise your profile.
The Review form can be accessed by Review your answers button at the bottom of the screen and brings all of your personal data together in a form for easy reviewing and editing.
Your Family
Let us know who's in your family - especially your financial partner and those who depend on you financially.
You can add and edit financial dependants (such as children) as well as add and edit a financial partner (such as a spouse), provided you have consent from this person to add and maintain personal information on their behalf.
Other relationships (such as partners) may have already been recorded by us and show in your list without an edit or delete option. If any of these family members need amending then just get in touch.
Once you're happy that all of your family members are included, then use the "Yes" button at the bottom of your list to indicate your family is complete.
Employment
Add yours and your financial partner's current employment status and remuneration details at the top of the screen. If you've not been in your current roles long then you can add some employment history too at the bottom of the screen. If we want you to add more employment history then the screen will indicate this.
Your Home
Use this section to add and maintain your current address and residence history.
When you add a current address for a home you own you will also be given an up-to-date valuation of the property by Zoopla (provided they have one). This value is then recorded against your property asset as part of your net worth.
If you've not lived at your current address long you can also provide some address history at the bottom of the screen. If we want you to add more address history then the screen will indicate this.
Contact Details
Add and maintain contact details. You can add and edit them all from the same screen. You can mark a contact as your preferred method and we'll use that to contact you where we can.
Assets & Liabilities
Review your assets and liabilities and add any which aren't listed. You can add and maintain a variety of different types including savings, investments, protection policies and liabilities (debts).
Once you're happy that all of your assets and liabilities are included, then use the "Yes" button at the bottom of your list to indicate your portfolio is complete.
Your Income
Use this section to add and maintain the details of your sources of income. Income is recorded under different categories and you can record income for yourself and your financial partner as well as joint income.
Once all of your income is recorded you complete the section by selecting the income complete "Yes" button below the income categories.
Your Expenditure
Use this section to add and maintain a record of your expenditures. Income is recorded under different categories and you can record income for yourself and your financial partner as well as joint income.
Once all of your expenditure is recorded you complete the section by selecting the expenditure complete "Yes" button below the expenditure categories.
When completing income and expenditure details in Profile, you can now choose to fill the data from your Open Banking transactions to give an up-to-date and accurate representation. This is possible because each transaction is automatically categorized based on the transaction details.
You will see a new panel in the Income & Expenditure area of the Profile. If you have already linked your accounts you will see them here. If you have not linked accounts then you can do that from this area in addition to the Spending tab.
Upon selecting to Update Income or Update Expenditure, you will be presented with a pop-up which explains the process:
The update process just takes a few minutes to complete. Firstly you should select which accounts you want to include, and how much account history you want to include also. You can select from 1, 3, 6 or 12 months, depending on how much account history is available. Note that where multiple accounts are selected, only periods of months are available where there are transactions for both accounts – for example if the first account has 6 months of history and second has 12 months of history, then only 6 months would be available to select.
Once you have selected, you will see a summary of all of the category totals for where your transactions have been automatically allocated. Totals are calculated per month but also shown annually for information. The monthly calculation for each category is very simple and just divides the sum of all of the transactions allocated to that category by the number of months selected.
If there are any obvious issues with the summary, you can select "Transaction History", from where you can analyze and re-categorize your transactions if needed.
*This is shortened to illustrate – normally there would be a larger number of categories with totals.
After the summary, you will cycle through each category where you will have the choice to:
Where the profile is a joint profile, you can allocate each amount to either yourselves, your partner, or as a joint income/expense.
Once you have reviewed all of the categories for which you have amounts allocated from your linked accounts, you may also need to review any amounts which were already existing in your income/expenditure profile but for which no transactions were allocated during the process. This is to ensure that your whole profile is accurate.
You are now finished and will see a confirmation that the process is complete:
Since you are free to keep your profile information as up-to-date and accurate as possible, you can repeat the process any time you need to.
Sending With An Attachment?
To add with an attachment simply click the "Add attachment from: Computer" button on the Compose Message dialogue.
You can select multiple files from the same folder. To select multiple files hold down the 'Ctrl' key while you select the files that you want.
If your adviser has sent you a secure message with an attachment on it, you can upload this to 'Your Documents' if you want.
The icon here file_download will move the attachment to 'Your Documents'. After pressing you will get a confirmation message.
Moving an attachment to 'Your Documents' will reduce your overall storage quota.
Secure Messages act as an audit trail for correspondence between you and your adviser. As such, they cannot be deleted.
Insight generation and email notification are intrinsically linked. If you turn off a specific insight, this means that the insight will not be generated and you will not receive an email notification for that insight.
You cannot turn off only email notifications.
Please use this check-box found at 'Manage Insights' tab to enable and disable specific insights.
Insights are little snippets of information that relate to you and your portfolio, which are generated based on rules that exist in PFP.
Your latest Insights can be viewed within the 'Insights Widget' on the Dashboard. You can view the full list of Insights by tapping the 'View All' button or by navigating to Insights via the side menu.
The arrow on your latest Insights act as a navigation point to other relevant areas of the PFP site.
You will be notified via email when new insights have been generated.
Specific Insight Descriptions
The Tasks page shows outstanding tasks that your adviser / advisory firm is performing, which relate to you, that your adviser has elected to share with you.
Its purpose is to provide you the tasks that are being performed and the current status of those tasks.
The tasks listed originate from your adviser's system and are controlled by them. As a task changes from one status to another, you will see the status updated, but won't be able to interact with this screen.
If you haven't found what you were looking for in the User Guide then please contact your adviser for help. You can use the 'Contact' button beside your adviser details in the PFP header, or use the 'Questions? Let's Talk' button where available.