No. There are some exemptions, as follows:

1. New clients, who have been a client for less than 6 months (including clients inherited from a colleague)
2. M&A clients, whose original firm was acquired by or merged with yours in the last 12 months
3. Clients without an email address
4. Celebrity clients
5. Clients who are unwell or infirm
6. Clients of advisers who are under notice
7. Clients who have previously reviewed you on VouchedFor within the last 12 months
8. Corporate clients
9. Clients who have not paid you for a service within the last 12 months

Yes. The deadline to qualify as a Top Rated Firm 2025 is 31st December 2024. We will assess which firms have qualified on this date.

Top Rated Firm accreditation is available to all Elevation member firms that meet the criteria. As such, a valid Elevation subscription is required to qualify as a 2025 Top Rated Firm, no other charges apply.

The reason for making Elevation a core part of the criteria is that its industry benchmarks and reports are the best data we have on whether a firm is doing a good job for its clients. Plus, the system tells us whether firms are engaging with and acting on their data to consistently improve client outcomes.

An adviser ‘counts’ towards a firm name based on the FCA ID they have added to VouchedFor.

For a principal or directly authorised firm to qualify, all their advisers (incl. appointed representatives) will count in the Top Rated Firm process.

It is possible for an Appointed Representative (AR) to qualify without all ARs associated with their principal qualifying. This is provided that the AR is a limited company and ALL advisers associated with their trading style form part of the Top Rated Firm process.

There are 3 main ways:

1. Top Rated Firms sign a pledge to invite all non exempt clients and agree to VouchedFor auditing them to check this.
2. Data trends, we’ll be able to tell if a firm’s reviewers’ profiles are inconsistent with other firms’.
3. In marketing Top Rated Firms, we’ll make the criteria clear, so if a client who hasn’t been invited to leave a review sees this, they are likely to ask us why.

For simplicity, we have taken the benchmarks at a point in time and will keep them fixed as the criteria for qualification.  This is to avoid expecting firms to hit a moving target.

Possibly. The award is grounded in data – so we need a certain number of data points to be sure it’s statistically significant. You need a minimum of 20 client’s feedback from 2024 with the questions that power our Elevation system answered.

If it’s not possible to reach 20 this year, you can start working towards the accreditation next year.

At least you tried, which is testament to you ‘walking the walk’ with transparency. Plus, in trying to qualify, you will undoubtedly have collected evidence to help you meet the Consumer Duty, and identify opportunities to improve referrals and reduce risk.

Applicant firms can decide whether to count couples as one client or two clients for the purpose of calculating required invites and response rate.

However, consistency in how a client is defined is required. I.e. should you invite both partners in a couple to leave a review, then the response rate will be calculated based on two invitations being sent.

We would take a view on which of the benchmarks to apply based on the proportion of your reviews relating to each service. If the vast majority of your reviews relate to financial advice for example, we would rely on the advocacy and risk benchmarks for financial advice.

Provided that you invited them through VouchedFor and at least 20 have answered the private questions that fuel our industry benchmarks, you can qualify.

As this is a firm-level award, feedback needs to be invited from all of your clients (with some exemptions, see relevant FAQ), so all advisers need to be involved. The only exception to this would be if you have a new adviser with no clients.

It depends when you stop.

Firms who meet the Top Rated Firm criteria by the qualification deadline (31st December 2024) will qualify as Top Rated Firms.

The decision as to which firms qualify as Top Rated Firms will be decided based on scores as at 31st December. Firms that qualify will feature as Top Rated Firms throughout 2024.

The only exception to this would be if we see a sharp drop in a firms’ scores, in which case we reserve the right to remove Top Rated Firm status.

They depend on what services you offer. One of the team can share the most relevant stats on their call with you.

Thanks to the introduction of the Elevation software, you no longer have to manually notify the VouchedFor team when you achieve the qualification criteria. Once you reach the criteria your firm will be automatically flagged, and provided you maintain the requirements, you will be listed as a 2025 Top Rated Firm.

Yes, provided you remain a member of Elevation at the time of going to print, your firm will be featured in each edition of the Guide (March, June and September). Firms must remain an active member of Elevation so that we can verify that they remain committed to inviting all clients to give feedback.

You only need 20 reviews in total.  We’ll apply the most appropriate Elevation benchmarks dependent on the split of reviews by service.

Passionate Advocacy benchmarks:

• Financial advice: 20%
• Mortgage: 50%
• Protection: 50%

Risk benchmarks:

• Financial advice: 75%
• Mortgage: 75%
• Protection: 75%

Yes. We’ll display the total number of reviews and total rating – all 2024 reviews will count, even if Elevation questions weren’t asked.  Obviously only those with Elevation data will count toward the industry benchmark.

We’ll take a firm’s average score over the qualification period (1st January 2024 – 31st December 2024). Firms are able to filter their dashboard to show their score for that period.

We will be using the response rates as calculated in the Elevation product. If you invite outside product you need to provide evidence that every client has been invited