Quick Start

1. If you haven't already done so, sign up for free. This gives you access to the app and ensures you don't lose the information you enter. You'll receive an email with a link to activate your account.
2. Log in to your account.
3. Once you've logged in you'll land on a page where you can create a Plan. A Plan represents the finances of either a single person or a couple, both now and in the future. The Plan page itself is where you enter high-level information, including your attitudes to things such as risk and leaving a legacy. You can also optionally specify a Lifetime Contingency, which represent money to be spent on unforeseen things over the lifetime of the Plan. If you're not yet sure of everything you should enter on this page, most of it can be deferred till later. Once you've entered the high-level Plan information, press the Save Plan button to create the Plan.
4. After saving your Plan you'll be taken to the Members page. A Plan can have either one or two members. For each Member you first enter high-level information (labelled Member Information). This includes the date of birth, the gender, and optionally an adjustment to life expectancy based on specific personal circumstances. It also includes summarised totals for various categories of financial assets owned by the Member. [Note: When entering dates of birth (or any other dates on other pages) using the calendar pop-up, make sure you've selected the month and year before you finally click on the day of the month.]
5. Once you've created a Member you can add further specific information for that Member by choosing from the displayed options. These include guaranteed income (which includes annuities & Defined Benefit pension income), employments, self-employments, other income, debts, life insurance and inheritances.
6. If any Members of the Plan own properties or other tangible assets, you should enter these on the Assets page. Such tangible assets can include a main home, any holiday homes, buy-to-let properties, undeveloped land, cars, works of art, etc.
7. Next you should go to the Spending page. Here you can enter both your essential and discretionary spending. It's important to enter all your essential spending. Your discretionary spending entered here is optional, and is meant to represent what you're actually spending now, not what you plan to spend in the future. It's not used in projection calculations, but if you decide to enter it the program will later compare it to what it calculates you can actually afford.
8. By this point you should have entered everything the program needs in order to generate your Strategy. You should double-check your entries for any errors or omissions. Once you're satisfied with what you've entered, go to the Strategy page and press the 'Generate' button. This will kick off the optimisation process, resulting in a Strategy. If you're busy you don't need to wait for it to complete: The program will email you when your Strategy is ready.
9. Once your Strategy is ready it will appear on the Strategy page. You Strategy consists of the high-level financial decisions that the program has optimised for you. The meaning of some of these may not be immediately obvious. You can get a brief explanation of each Strategy item by hovering over the adjacent green circle with a question mark.
10. To see the implications of following your Strategy go to the Results page. On this page you'll find numerous charts and reports that help give you an in-depth understanding of what your financial future may hold. There's also a detailed explanatory report that includes an action list for putting your current Strategy into practice.
11. If you want to try to improve your Strategy, first make sure there aren't any errors in your Plan. Then go back to the Strategy page. There you can either ask the program to optimise it further, or you can edit it manually (at least a Standard subscription is required for this).
12. Should your circumstances change, you can always go back and edit your Plan. After this you should optimise (or manually edit) your Strategy, otherwise your Strategy won't have taken your changes into account.
13. Over time, even if you don't make any changes, the results of your Strategy may change. This could be due to changes to program settings outside your control, such as tax rates, retirement legislation or annuity rates. It could also be due to the fact that the Members of the Plan are getting older, which means that life expectancies gradually shorten. This means it's a good idea to review your Strategy periodically, and if necessary to re-optimise it.
14. As sophisticated as EvolveMyRetirement^® is, we strongly recommend that you consult a financial advisor before acting on any Strategy it generates. We've made it very easy to share your Plan with someone else, and it costs you nothing; in fact you'll be rewarded with additional credits to optimise your Plan. Just return to the Plan page and press the Share button. You'll be asked for the email address of your nominated person, for example a financial advisor or family member. They'll be notified by email.