A new SJP group claim raises an uncomfortable question for the financial advice profession: do recruits understand the risks as clearly as they understand the opportunity?
By Steve Conley | Academy of Life Planning | 27 October 2026
Imagine being offered a new career helping people make better financial decisions.
You receive training, gain a qualification and join an established financial services business. You may be encouraged to build a practice of your own. Over time, you develop relationships, serve clients and create an income for yourself and your family.
It sounds like the beginning of a professional career.
But before you accept, there is a question you need to ask:
What happens if, one day, you want to leave?
Not just whether you can leave. What happens to the clients, the income, the value of the business and any debt you have taken on along the way?
That question has become particularly relevant following news that a proposed group action against St. James’s Place (SJP) has secured litigation funding.
Two stories about the same profession
Earlier this month, SJP celebrated 200 newly qualified advisers graduating from its Financial Adviser Academy. Those graduates deserve recognition for their hard work and commitment to a new career. professionaladviser.com
At the same time, law firm Robertson Pugh Associates is bringing together former SJP appointed representatives who allege that their practices were transferred to other advisers within the network without fair compensation. The proposed claim has now secured funding from a specialist litigation funder. professionaladviser.com
These are two stories about the same profession.
One is about the excitement of entering it. The other is about the consequences some people say they faced when leaving.
The allegations have not been established by a court. SJP has previously said it resolves contractual issues fairly and would robustly defend a claim. www.fnlondon.com
But we do not need to wait for a legal outcome to ask whether recruits understand the arrangements they are entering.
What does it mean to build a business?
SJP’s Academy offers a fully funded career-change programme. Its website says graduates can choose to build their own business or join an established practice. It also highlights the capital value that can be built through its Business Sale and Purchase, or BSP, model. sjp.co.uk
The BSP scheme can help an adviser buy a practice or client book from another adviser in the SJP network. SJP has described providing loans to buyers and supporting the transfer between seller and buyer. St. James’s Place
There can be benefits in that arrangement. A retiring adviser may find a successor. A buyer may gain an established practice. Clients may have continuity of service.
But the questions are:
What has the buyer actually acquired? What do they control? And what happens to the loan and the client relationships if their agreement with the network ends?
Those answers will depend on the individual’s contracts and circumstances. Academy graduates may enter different kinds of roles, and not everyone will take out a BSP loan. It would be wrong to suggest that every SJP adviser faces the same obligations.
It would be equally wrong to assume that everyone understands those obligations simply because they appear somewhere in an agreement.
The exit test
Earlier this year, I supported an adviser who was leaving SJP. My role was a short, pre-legal bridge: helping him understand the demand he had received, manage the immediate distress and avoid agreeing to anything before speaking with a solicitor.
In a meeting about his departure, an SJP representative explained the position SJP was asserting: his clients would revert to SJP Wealth Management, while an outstanding BSP loan of several hundred thousand pounds would become repayable when his contract ended.
That was SJP’s stated position in that individual meeting. I am not suggesting that it determines the legal rights and obligations of anyone else, or that it represents the outcome of the adviser’s case.
What struck me was the human reality.
A person can enter an arrangement believing they are building a professional future. Years later, they may face the prospect of losing the income associated with that practice while being asked to repay a substantial debt.
Whatever the legal position, that prospect can be frightening. The effects do not stop at the adviser. Financial uncertainty can reach into a household, a marriage, a family’s plans and a person’s sense of security.
People need support at such moments. They also need the chance to understand the risks before they enter the arrangement.
Would you make the same choice if you understood the exit?
This is not an argument that people should never join SJP, borrow to buy a practice or work within an advice network.
People are entitled to make those choices. Some will find the support, training and opportunities valuable.
But a meaningful choice requires more than an attractive account of what success might look like. It requires a clear understanding of what happens if circumstances change.
A recruit should be able to see, in plain English and before making a commitment:
- What am I joining? Am I an employee, self-employed, an appointed representative or the owner of a separate business?
- What do I own? What rights do I have over the practice, the client relationships and the income they generate?
- What might I owe? Could I be asked to repay training costs, loans or other amounts? Under what circumstances?
- Am I personally liable? Would a personal guarantee put my own assets at risk?
- What happens if I leave voluntarily? Can I sell my practice, retain any value or continue serving clients who wish to remain with me?
- What happens if my contract is suspended or terminated? What happens to my income, clients, debts and ability to work elsewhere?
- Can the loan be called in early? If so, when, and how quickly could repayment be required?
- Who decides what is fair value? What information and options are available if I disagree?
- What changes if I join a competitor? Are there restrictions or repayment obligations?
- Can I take independent advice before signing? Will I have enough time and all the relevant documents to do so?
These are not awkward questions. They are the questions a financial professional would want a client to ask before entering a significant financial commitment.
Recruits deserve the same standard of clarity.
An illustration worth providing
Imagine an adviser borrows £250,000 to buy a practice.
The recruitment and business-development conversation may rightly explore the potential income, the support available and the value the adviser hopes to build.
But it should also explain the less comfortable scenarios:
- What if the adviser wants to leave after two years?
- What if the relationship with the network breaks down?
- What if the contract is suspended?
- What happens to the client relationships and the income?
- How much of the loan might still be outstanding?
- Could the balance become repayable immediately?
- Would the adviser receive anything for the practice?
- What would the consequences be for their household?
The £250,000 is an illustration, not a description of a standard SJP arrangement. The answers would depend on the agreements.
That is precisely why people need to see worked examples before they sign. An illustration cannot replace the contract, but it can make its consequences much easier to understand.
A responsibility across the profession
SJP has previously answered questions about advisers being tied into the organisation through debt. It has said its Academy training is free, while noting that it may seek to recover some training costs if someone leaves to join a competitor early in their career. It has also described its BSP scheme as a way of helping partners buy and sell businesses. Careers Zone
Those explanations are a starting point. The next question is whether a prospective recruit can see, clearly and in one place, how the relevant terms would affect them in different circumstances.
This matters beyond SJP. Across financial services, firms promote career opportunities, training, business ownership and succession plans. Professional bodies celebrate new entrants. Practice principals recruit and develop advisers.
All of them have a role in making sure that enthusiasm for recruitment is matched by clarity about risk.
Leaders who hold influential positions in the profession should be willing to ask these questions publicly, even when the answers may be uncomfortable for their own organisations. Professional integrity includes making sure the next generation understands the commitments it is being invited to make.
A simple proposal
Every firm recruiting advisers into a role involving business ownership, financing or material repayment obligations should provide a short career entry and exit statement before the individual commits.
It should set out:
- What the person owns and controls.
- What they might owe, and to whom.
- Whether they are personally liable.
- What happens to clients, income and business value if they leave.
- How the position changes if the contract is suspended or terminated.
- Worked examples of different exit scenarios.
- Where to obtain independent legal advice.
The statement should be provided early enough for the recruit to read it, discuss it with their family if appropriate, and seek advice before making a decision.
That should not be controversial in a profession built around helping people understand financial commitments.
Agency applies to advisers too
At the Academy of Life Planning, we talk about restoring human agency: helping people understand, question, choose and act with confidence.
That principle applies to financial professionals as much as it applies to their clients.
A person considering a career in advice should not have to choose between pursuing meaningful work and protecting their ability to make a different choice later.
The proposed SJP group action may reveal more about the experiences of advisers who have left the network. The allegations will need to be examined on their merits.
In the meantime, there is a question the whole industry can answer now:
If the opportunity is clear enough to promote, why shouldn’t the cost of leaving be just as clear?
Anyone considering a role or business arrangement should review the relevant documents and obtain independent legal advice suited to their circumstances.
Are you an SJP adviser feeling caught in an arrangement you’re struggling to leave?
If you’d like to talk it through in confidence before approaching a solicitor or discussing your intentions with the business, you can book a 50-minute Zoom call with me for £50.
We can explore your situation, the questions you need answered and your possible next steps. Where legal advice is needed, I can help you prepare for that conversation.
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