AI for financial advisers: a careful start

Financial advisers use AI for the work around advice: drafting client letters, summarising meeting notes, explaining financial ideas in plain language and preparing for reviews. The advice itself stays with you. ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini are not licensed advisers, they can be wrong about products and rules, and they should never see identifiable client data unless your practice has approved that use.

This guide covers safe places to start, what stays out of chatbots, how to check AI's work and where to learn it live for free. It is general information, not legal or compliance advice.

Key facts about our free AI workshop

• Free, live on Zoom, every weekend
• 3 hours, 12:00-15:00 SAST (10:00-13:00 UK, 11:00-14:00 CET), on Saturday or Sunday (you pick one)
• ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini on your own work
• No coding needed

Where can AI help a financial adviser?

Start with tasks where you supply the facts and the tool supplies a clear draft:

• Meeting notes. Turn your rough notes from a review (without client identifiers) into a structured summary of goals, concerns and agreed next steps.
• Client letters. Draft a letter that confirms what was discussed, which you then align with your record of advice and your practice's templates.
• Plain-language explanations. Ask for a simple explanation of a concept such as compound growth, inflation or retirement annuities in general, written for a client who is not a finance person.
• Review preparation. Ask for a checklist of questions to cover in an annual review for a client at a given life stage.
• Newsletters and articles. Draft general educational content for clients, which you check for accuracy and compliance before it goes out.
• Practice admin. Summarise long product updates or emails from providers into what changes and what you need to do.

No coding needed. Join live: the questions and breakouts only happen live, and you leave with something you can use on Monday. Save my free seat.

What must stay with the adviser?

In South Africa, advice on financial products falls under the Financial Advisory and Intermediary Services (FAIS) Act and is supervised by the Financial Sector Conduct Authority (FSCA). Whatever tools you use, these stay with you:

• The needs analysis and the recommendation for each client.
• Product comparisons and suitability, based on current, verified product information.
• The record of advice and any disclosures your obligations require.
• Anything a client could reasonably read as advice.

Use AI to save time on drafting, never to decide what a client should do. Confirm how your obligations apply to AI tools with your compliance officer.

What client data should stay out of chatbots?

Before you paste anything into an AI tool, remove:

• Names, ID numbers, contact details and dates of birth.
• Policy, account and investment numbers.
• Income, health, family and other personal details that identify the client.
• Statements and documents from product providers that carry client details.

The Protection of Personal Information Act (POPIA) covers this information. Describe situations in general terms ("a client in their fifties with two children at university") and the help you get is the same. Our guide to POPIA and AI at work explains more. This is general information; confirm your obligations with your compliance officer or an attorney.

How do I check AI's work in a regulated field?

• Never trust a product fact from the tool. Fees, terms, tax treatment and limits change. Use the provider's current documents and official sources.
• Check every number. Recalculate projections and figures yourself or in your own planning software.
• Read for implied advice. Remove any sentence that recommends a product or action you have not decided on.
• Use approved wording. Keep your practice's disclosures and templates as the base, and let AI help only with the plain-language parts.

Ask the tool to list what it assumed. In this field, assumptions are where the risk sits.

Which tool should I use?

ChatGPT, Claude and Gemini all handle summarising and drafting well. If your practice or licensee has approved a tool, use that one. Otherwise, run the same anonymised task through each and compare accuracy and how much you had to edit. Our guides to AI for accountants and writing work emails with AI cover related tasks.

What should I do in my first week?

1. Ask your compliance officer or licensee what AI use is allowed.
2. Take one set of anonymised meeting notes and turn them into a structured summary.
3. Draft one general client newsletter item and check it line by line.
4. Save the prompts that worked, with the checks you made.

What does the free workshop cover?

Over three hours on Zoom you work through choosing the right tool, writing prompts that work, researching and drafting quickly, getting answers from your own documents, making images and slides, building your own AI assistant, automating a repetitive task, making a simple web app without code, and understanding AI agents. You leave with a 30-day plan. Our hosts have taught more than 12,000 people.

It runs every weekend, on Saturday and again on Sunday, so you can pick the day that suits you. The times are set for South Africa, and the UK and Europe times above work for learners there too.

No coding needed. Join live: the questions and breakouts only happen live, and you leave with something you can use on Monday. Save my free seat.

Frequently asked questions

Can AI give financial advice to my clients?

No. Advice stays your responsibility as the adviser. Use AI for admin and first drafts, and make every recommendation yourself under the rules that apply to you.

Can I put client information into a chatbot?

Not without care. Remove names, ID numbers, policy and account numbers, and financial details that identify the client, and follow your practice's policy and POPIA.

Do I need to know how to code?

No. The tools work in plain language, so any adviser who can write a clear client letter can learn to write a clear prompt.