Wealth Manager: The UK's first turnkey asset manager is unlocking adviser assets

The Tamp model has proved remarkably successful in the US, where it originated in 1974, allowing small businesses to essentially outsource all but their non-core functions, from asset allocation models to compliance.

As of 2010, the top 10 providers who overwhelmingly dominate the market ran $255 billion, according to research from US trade title Advisor Perspectives.

The business initially launched as Evidence Based Investment Solutions, a loose group of advisers with a shared interest in passive funds and asset allocation. When it came to drawing up a single model the group failed to find common ground however, and Burgess, who chaired the meetings, instead decided to commercialise the concept independently.

The flat fee of £180 a month is economical enough that the smallest adviser client runs less than £3 million, and is surely good value for money for the largest, at £50 million. Crucially, that money is levied from the adviser, rather than the client, offering VAT efficiencies versus outsourcing.

‘It makes my life so much easier because I don’t have to look at funds every month,’ one of Burgess’ clients, Matthew Walne of Santorini Financial Planning, told Wealth Manager’s sister title New Model Adviser last year.

‘It’s a huge time saver and all my clients like it because it closely matches their attitude to risk rather than having three or four portfolios, which they may only just fit into.’

In both spirit and practice the service is a long way from the slick packages provided by the 7IMs, Brewin Dolphins and Quilters of this world, instead promoting a DIY ethos of tinkering and shared experience.

A seminar organised by the company at the end of 2012, for instance, was filled with 30-odd enthusiastic advisers from all corners of the UK, gathered to listen, talk and offer feedback on their experiences of rebalancing – which seems to be something of a stumbling block for many. 

The overall atmosphere of discovery, self-help and improvised solutions to common problems would surely have been familiar to many homesteaders and prospectors.