Generation Money’s team writes with you, the reader, in mind at all times.
We extensively test and use all of the products and platforms that we review. In fact, our team members have been using lots of the investment platforms that we review for many years already.
At Generation Money we always seek to add value where possible. This includes original data analysis and research to enhance our expert commentary. For example, many of the largest investment platforms in the UK have complicated pricing systems which depend on the assets you invest in, how much you want to invest and the type of account you have. We do the hard work for you by telling you which is the best price depending on the type of account you want to open, the amount you have to invest and the investments you want to put your money into.
We also always make sure there’s separation between our editorial and analysis content and any brands or companies that we partner with.
Overview
At Generation Money you won’t get information from self-declared “money experts” who have no credentials or professional experience to their name but may be good at online marketing.
All of our content is written and edited by current or former finance professionals. Some of the team’s qualifications include Chartered Accountants, Masters Degrees in Finance and CFAs. The team’s professional experience includes Banking, Big Tech, FinTechs, Investment Management and Trading.
We take pride in offering the reader unbiased and accurate information to help them make better financial decisions.
Core Principles
Below we outline the core principles that guide our editorial policy at Generation Money.
Independence
We follow strict editorial guidelines to ensure that our content is not influenced or affected by the companies we write about.
Any rankings we produce, for example on the best investment apps, are unbiased and put together without regard to any commercial relationships we may have. All of our reviews follow a stringent editorial policy – see more below.
Accuracy
All of our articles are thoroughly reviewed and fact-checked by our editorial team to ensure they meet our standards.
We often perform analysis and calculations in-house by our team of finance experts to add value to our articles. Where we produce our own original analysis we always make our methods clear and cite the data sources we have used.
Prices, products and rates change frequently in the finance industry so we also always make the date clear of when we checked a price or rate. We aim to keep all articles updated frequently to reflect the most up-to-date information. If you do notice any inaccuracies please email [email protected].
Expertise
One of the key ways in which Generation Money differs from many other personal finance and investing sites is that all content is written and/or edited by writers with professional finance experience and qualifications.
We outline the experience and qualifications of our team on our About Page and we always aim to use their experience in the most relevant way possible. For example, Alex worked in banking for almost a decade and writes or reviews all banking-related content.
Dominic, another team member, has a Degree in Maths with Physics and a Masters in Forensic Accounting along with many years experience working with data. He reviews and produces a lot of the original analysis and research we carry out.
Where we have used or quoted outside experts or sources we always identify them and ensure they are credible and reputable. Any outside data we use is always cited.
Added Value
We are a team of finance professionals and this allows us, in our opinion, to offer deeper insight and analysis than you would get elsewhere. We understand how finance and investment platforms and apps work because we’ve either worked for them, founded them or invested in them ourselves.
Want to know how robo-advisors make money? Well, Alex – our founder – has pitched the very same business model to private equity investors. Want to know the difference between a bank and a building society? We’ve worked at major banks and understand the fundamental differences.
We seek to offer our unique personal insight in all the content we produce, including reviews and guides, to make it as useful as possible to you.
Review Guidelines – How We Review Products and Platforms
Financial decisions are hugely important and can be difficult to make. We hold ourselves to the highest standards when writing our articles. Below we go into more detail about how we review products and platforms and how we choose them for inclusion in our guides.
Look for regulatory approval and licences
Regulation and approvals are hugely important in the world of finance, especially with investing where your capital is at risk. The first criteria we look for is whether or not a platform, app or product is regulated in the UK.
This will typically be with the Financial Conduct Authority (FCA) for most finance platforms, but could also be the Prudential Regulation Authority (PRA) which oversees bank regulation on behalf of the Bank of England.
Companies regulated by the FCA will usually be subject to the Financial Ombudsman Service (FOS) to handle customer complaints, and this is another body that we check for any relevant feedback.
Larger FCA-regulated investment firms typically also hold Financial Services Compensation Scheme (FSCS) protection, which is a type of regulator-driven insurance in case a firm goes into liquidation. We also research FSCS protection as one of our main regulatory checks in our reviews.
Alex, our founder, used to work on regulatory submissions for the PRA and the Bank of England at Barclays and knows full well how important it is that companies comply. You’ll often see our assessment of a product’s regulatory status under the “Is It Safe?” section of our reviews.
Test all products ourselves
When reviewing a product, we always test it ourselves first and that often means using our own money to execute trades on the investment platforms we test. In fact, many investment platform features are only accessible if you fund your account.
When it comes to trading and investing platforms, only by live trading can we be sure whether or not to recommend it. This also applies to the other platforms and apps we review, including payments and banking.
This is one of our most important review processes for our head-to-head comparisons in particular, where we will assess the platform, including their app, and compare it against competitors.
Check customer feedback
Although we extensively test and research each product that we review ourselves, it’s important to see what other customers are saying about them, too.
Our reviews include the views of verified customers from review sites such as Trustpilot to make sure we get as much of a complete understanding of a product as possible.
Understand who will benefit from the product
Financial products are diverse and varied so it’s incredibly important to understand who the main customer of a product or platform is.
For example, in our investing reviews it’s clear that some trading platforms are aimed at younger users who may value the importance of social trading features. Other platforms have invested in their pensions offering and are likely to be targeting an older demographic than trading apps.
Therefore it’s crucial that we put ourselves in the mind of a target customer when we write our reviews so that we understand the key information that they will want.
Study the company behind the product and their history
We carry out in-depth research on the companies behind the products and platforms that we review, including their founders and executive team.
This is especially important in the FinTech space where many new finance apps are popping up all the time.
In addition to start-ups, many of the bigger and more established investment platforms have launched new brands or apps under different names to modernise their offering. We always let you know who the ultimate holding company is if it’s not clear from the brand name, as well as looking at how a platform’s ownership may affect its safety and reliability.
You will usually find our analysis of the brand or company towards the beginning of our reviews.
Use our experience to add value
All reviews at Generation Money are written by finance professionals, by which we mean the reviewer has worked full-time in the financial services industry, and typically also has relevant professional and/or academic qualifications. This is in stark contrast to many other personal finance and investing sites which are often founded by marketers with no finance experience or qualifications.
For example, most of our in-depth investment platform and digital bank reviews are written by our founder, Alex. Alex is a Chartered Accountant, holds a degree from the London School of Economics and is a former Vice President at Barclays Bank.
If we’ve worked for or been involved with similar companies to the ones we are reviewing we add our personal insight to help you decide if a product is right for you.
What We Avoid In Our Reviews
We’re Never Influenced By Commercial Relationships
For some of the products we review, we may receive a payment in the event that a reader clicks through and signs up to that particular product. However, we never let this affect our editorial integrity and will not promote products that we don’t think are suitable or worth signing up to.
We always rank the product we think is best at the top of our pages regardless of whether we receive payment via affiliate links. Read more on how we finance this site.
We Never Post Content Without Thorough Research
All reviews and guides on Generation Money are the result of detailed research by finance professionals. When you read our reviews you can be sure that it’s underpinned by in-depth research and testing.
We pride ourselves on integrity and trustworthiness and always aim to use our professional experience to add as much value to our content for you, the reader, as possible.
We Do Not Offer Investment Advice
Despite the fact that our team is staffed by finance experts and professionals, we never give investment advice. You must always do your own research and make your own decisions. We do, however, aim to help equip you with the knowledge and tools to make better financial decisions.
How This Site Is Financed
We have a commercial relationship with some of the brands and companies that we write about. This means that if a reader were to click through to that brand’s website from one of the links in our articles, we may receive financial compensation (at no cost to you).
This allows us to keep Generation Money free to use and should make no difference to how you use this site. Whether we have a commercial partnership with a company makes no difference to how we rank products and platforms. It also does not affect our editorial policy in any way. We aim to cover all of the relevant products and platforms on the market and we cover the best ones whether or not we have a commercial relationship with them. For more details, read our How this site is financed page.
