IT & Microsoft cloud for financial advice & wealth
Secure Microsoft 365, client portals, recoverable records and incident readiness for FCA-authorised financial planners, wealth managers and IFAs.
Checked 4 October 2026. Built from the full sector page.
In short: Secure Microsoft 365 and client portals, email that resists impersonation, records you can produce, and a plan for the day something goes wrong. Start with email and identity: that is where client money and client trust are most exposed, and it is the evidence the FCA and your clients will ask about first.
What changes in this sector
Advice and wealth firms have grown into their technology a piece at a time: a planning platform here, a client portal there, Microsoft 365 for everything in between, and more of it reached from home than ever before. That is normal, and it works. What tends to lag behind is the evidence. When a client asks how their documents are protected, when a payment request arrives that looks exactly like a client's email, or when the FCA's new incident reporting rules arrive in March 2027, the firm needs answers that hold up.
What we would do
Start with email and identity. Payment-diversion attempts and account takeover are the risks most likely to reach your clients, and the controls that stop them are also the evidence the FCA, your clients and your insurer will ask about first. Then write the incident runbook, before the March 2027 reporting rules make the timing tighter.
- If you already hold Cyber Essentials, enforce MFA everywhere and test your restores, the next useful step is the incident runbook rather than more controls.
- If your network or platform provider runs most of your systems, focus on oversight: what they report to you, and what you can show the FCA.
When we are not the answer: If you want someone to take on your regulatory responsibility, no IT provider can, and one that offers to is overselling. We make the technology dependable and the evidence easy to produce. The judgement calls stay with you and your compliance adviser.
What we do for financial advice & wealth
- Microsoft 365 security posture reviewed and hardened in stages: MFA without exceptions, Conditional Access and device compliance
- Email security and impersonation protection against phishing and payment-diversion attempts, with SPF, DKIM and DMARC set correctly
- Client portal access secured through Microsoft 365 identity where the portal supports it, and guest access reviewed
- Backup of Microsoft 365 and key systems, with restores tested and recovery times written down
- Records kept retrievable for the periods your obligations set, held separately from day-to-day mailboxes
- An incident runbook that covers your FCA, ICO and client obligations, written before you need it
- Supplier oversight evidence: what we do, how we report it, and what you can show the FCA
- Help preparing for Cyber Essentials, which an independent Certification Body then assesses
What the last 12 months looked like
Three questions people ask
Do you understand FCA requirements for financial advice firms?
We work to the FCA Handbook as it applies to IT: SYSC on outsourcing, systems and records, the Principles for Businesses, and the incident reporting rules coming in March 2027.
Can we outsource our IT without losing control?
Yes. The FCA expects you to supervise what an IT provider does, not to do it yourself.
Does SYSC 15A operational resilience apply to us?
Probably not, if you are a typical small advice or wealth firm. SYSC 15A applies to enhanced scope SM&CR firms, banks, designated investment firms, building societies, Solvency II firms and a few others.
Ready to talk about your financial advice & wealth IT?
A short call about how your IT works today and what your sector asks of it. We will tell you plainly where we would start.
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Prefer to talk now? Call us on +44 (0)1482 770583.