Victoria Whittington Financial Planning

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Victoria Whittington Financial Planning Helping individuals, families and businesses plan, protect and grow their finances. Hi! My name is Victoria, thank you for making your way onto my page. The 'St.

Providing peace of mind today, by putting in place the building blocks required to achieve your future financial goals. I wholeheartedly believe that everyone has the right to, and could benefit from, personalised, holistic financial advice. No two people are the same. Your dreams for the future, those you hold dear, and your circumstances are all unique. So too should your financial plan be. By getting to know my clients I help them create the financial future they want and deserve. After over a decade working at various Investment Banks based in London, in 2023 my family and I took a long overdue leap of faith and embarked on a lifelong dream of living in the Cotswolds. In 2024, I took my first steps towards building my own Financial Advisory business, combining my passion for finance and drive to help people. For individuals and families, I can advise on:
🥰 how to protect you and your loved ones
🏡 help you save for a future goal or dream
🏖️ turn your retirement aspirations into reality. I can also assist with inheritance planning 👵, making sure that everything you’ve worked so hard for can be passed onto future generations the way you want and, in a tax efficient manner. For businesses, I can assist with:
💼 protecting you, your business and your shareholders
💷 tax efficient distribution of profits
🧓 pension auto-enrolment and contributions
📈 investment considerations
👬 employee benefits. Outside of the day job I enjoy being with my family ❤️, playing netball ⛹️‍♀️ and spending as much time outside 🌳 as I can - rain or shine! If you'd like to find out more, get in touch. You can
📞 01285 402309
📧 [email protected]
🛜 www.victoriawhittington.co.uk
🗓️ book a Zoom meeting: https://calendly.com/victoria-whittington

The value of an investment with St. James’s Place will be directly linked to the performance of the funds selected and may fall as well as rise. You may get back less than the amount invested. Pension auto-enrolment schemes are not regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority. Victoria Whittington Financial Planning is an Appointed Representative of and represents only St. James's Place Wealth Management plc (which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority) for the purpose of advising solely on the group's wealth management products and services, more details of which are set out on the group's website www.sjp.co.uk/products. James's Place Partnership' and the titles 'Partner' and 'Partner Practice' are marketing terms used to describe St. James's Place representatives. SJP Approved 5/11/2024

Many people know they “should” have a rainy-day fund. Far fewer have actually sat down and worked out what size their em...
15/10/2026

Many people know they “should” have a rainy-day fund. Far fewer have actually sat down and worked out what size their emergency savings pot should be. Just with most things, it isn’t one size fits all: a self-employed parent with irregular income needs a bigger buffer than a dual-income household with steady employed jobs.

It’s also important to decide what your fund might be needed for before you’re in the middle of needing it. Stripping everything back to bare survival spend sounds sensible on paper, but a redundancy or a health scare is stressful enough without cutting out every normal comfort at the same time. A more realistic target usually covers your normal monthly life, not just the bills, with one exception: holidays are the one thing that can reasonably pause.

Then pick 3 or 6 months depending on how exposed your income is to a bad month. Cash savings are useful here because they’re stable day to day, but worth remembering inflation can reduce their real value over time, so once your fund is built, it’s helpful to check that your account is actually paying a competitive rate rather than letting it sit at 0%.

Your emergency fund is the most important “insurance policy” that you’ll hopefully never need to use.

Save this if it’s useful.

Victoria Whittington Financial Planning is an Appointed representative of and represents only St. James’s Place Wealth Management Plc (which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority).

SJP Approved 18/09/2026

06/10/2026

This is a hypothetical example. It assumes a level £500 a month and a constant 7% average annual growth rate, used to show how the balance between what you’ve paid in and what growth has added changes over time. £500 a month works out at £6,000 a year, well within the £20,000 ISA allowance for 2026/27.

In the early years, almost all of the value within the stocks & shares ISA is what’s been contributed, and that’s normal. Each year’s growth gets added back into the pot and grows again the year after, but early on there simply isn’t much growth there yet to work with. That’s also the point where some people give up, because the balance doesn’t look like much. But the years that feel like nothing are doing the groundwork.

Held over a number of years, money invested like this has historically grown more than money left in a savings account with a bank or building society, and staying invested for longer gives any short-term falls more time to recover before you need it. That said, it’s never guaranteed. The value can go down as well as up, and you could get back less than you put in.

A stocks and shares ISA held this way shelters growth from Income Tax, Capital Gains Tax and Dividend Tax under the 2026/27 rules, though that tax treatment depends on the rules staying as they are, and they can change.

This post is for educational purposes and does not constitute financial advice.

Hi, I’m Victoria. I’m a Qualified & Regulated Financial Planner with 14+ years in financial services, and I’m on a mission to make finance feel simple, not scary. I’m also a self-confessed maths geek, and when I’m not talking investments, pensions or protection, I’m keeping up with my two lively girls.

I believe everyone deserves to understand their money. My page is here to help with exactly that, through financial planning.

Victoria Whittington Financial Planning is an Appointed Representative of and represents only St. James’s Place Wealth Management plc (which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority).

SJP Approved 01/10/2026

06/10/2026

Higher rate tax kicks in at £50,270 for Tax Year 2026/27 (England, Wales & NI), and as that threshold has been frozen for years, more people are starting to encounter it.
 
What Hannah did differently is put her overtime straight into her workplace pension through salary sacrifice, so the full amount goes to work for her future instead of losing a chunk to income tax and NI now. Tax treatment depends on your own circumstances though, and rules can change.
 
The £71,550 figure is based on 12 years of £4,000 contributions growing at 7% a year, just an illustration, not a promise. Pension money is invested, in things like shares, bonds and property, so its value moves with the markets and can fall as well as rise. But staying invested long-term has historically paid off, since markets tend to recover and grow over time.
 
Send this to someone you know who’s about to apply for funded childcare.
 
This post is for educational purposes and does not constitute financial advice.

Victoria Whittington Financial Planning is an Appointed Representative of and represents only St. James’s Place Wealth Management plc (which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority).

SJP Approved 22/09/2026

Once you’ve worked out the annual amount you think you’ll need in retirement, comment POT and I’ll send you the link to ...
01/09/2026

Once you’ve worked out the annual amount you think you’ll need in retirement, comment POT and I’ll send you the link to the SJP Pension Calculator so you can check, based on your current pension pots and contributions, whether you’re on track.

Most retirement planning starts with a vague number pulled from nowhere. A better starting point is your bank statements, which reflect your actual life. Add up what you’re currently spending each month right now.

Then adjust for what’s different by the time you might want to retire. If the mortgage will be paid off, take it out. Still renting? That cost is a big consideration, particularly as rents rarely go down.

And here’s the part we often underestimate: all the hours you currently give to work, what do you actually want to fill them with? Travel, grandchildren, a hobby that you can finally do properly, a business you’ve been putting off? Whatever it is, it usually costs something, so give it a realistic monthly figure and add it to your baseline.

Another consideration: would you rather stop working in one go, or ease into it, through fewer hours, part-time work, or a change of career? That changes both how much you need and when you need it by.

Add it all together and you’ve got your net number, the take-home amount you actually want each month. But don’t forget that HMRC will still want their cut. Income tax apply to pension income just as they do to a salary. Working backwards from your net target to a gross target is what actually tells you if your pension is on track. Tax rules can change over time, and how they apply to you will depend on your individual circumstances.

This post is for educational purposes and does not constitute financial advice.

21/08/2026

Your salary is more than a survival tool… it’s your ticket to financial freedom.
 
Yes, your salary pays the bills. But as and when a pay rise comes through, don’t just absorb it into your lifestyle.
 
Invest in yourself. Build skills that raise your earnings potential, or fund the business idea that excites you and could become financially rewarding in itself.
 
Buy assets. Investments that for the most part require very little input and earn while you sleep. Values can go down as well as up, and there’s no guarantee you’ll get back more than you put in, but historically, assets held over the long term have played a pivotal role in building wealth that income alone can’t.
 
It’s not possible to build financial freedom on income alone. Your salary needs to be doing more than keeping you afloat.
 
Nobody’s goal is to work forever. The goal is a life where your money works as hard as you do, so eventually you don’t have to.

This post is for educational purposes and does not constitute financial advice.

Stop waiting for ready…
21/08/2026

Stop waiting for ready…

21/08/2026

Your investment strategy & financial plan should be based on the life you want. Is yours?
 
Annabelle’s target is to stop full time work at 50, seven years before she can touch her pension without penalty.

The normal minimum pension age is currently 55 and is set to rise to 57 from 6 April 2028, so she won’t be able to access her pension without penalty before she turns 57.

Rather than treating this as a reason to delay, she splits her monthly saving. She continues to contribute £900 a month into her pension and starts investing £400 a month into a stocks and shares ISA. Her aim is for the ISA to provide an income for those seven years while the pension carries on growing untouched.

The value of both the pension and the ISA can go down as well as up, and Annabelle could get back less than was paid in, so the size of the bridge she needs depends on investment performance as well as her own spending. Pension access rules and tax treatment can also change before she reaches either age, which means by saving into a Stocks & Shares ISA she adds yet more flexibility to her financial plan should tax or regulatory changes occur.

This post is for educational purposes and does not constitute financial advice.

Sources: GOV.UK, Increasing the normal minimum pension age. St. James’s Place, ISA allowance 2026/27.

Childcare funding is far more complicated than it should be.There isn’t just one scheme. Depending on your circumstances...
03/08/2026

Childcare funding is far more complicated than it should be.

There isn’t just one scheme. Depending on your circumstances, you could be entitled to funded childcare, Tax-Free Childcare or other government support. Knowing what’s available could save your family thousands of pounds each year.

I’ve put together a simple guide that explains:

• The childcare funding available at each age
• Who qualifies for each scheme
• The £100,000 income limit
• How funded hours actually work
• When your entitlement starts
• The rules that often catch parents by surprise

Whether you’re expecting your first child, planning your return to work or already paying nursery fees, understanding what’s available can make a real difference.

Comment CHILDCARE and I’ll send you my free guide covering funded childcare, Tax-Free Childcare and the other support available.

Save this post so you’ve got it when you need it, and follow Victoria Whittington for more practical tips to help your family make the most of the financial support available.

Childcare funding is far more complicated than it should be.There isn’t just one scheme. Depending on your circumstances...
03/08/2026

Childcare funding is far more complicated than it should be.

There isn’t just one scheme. Depending on your circumstances, you could be entitled to funded childcare, Tax-Free Childcare or other government support. Knowing what’s available could save your family thousands of pounds each year.

I’ve put together a simple guide that explains:

• The childcare funding available at each age
• Who qualifies for each scheme
• The £100,000 income limit
• How funded hours actually work
• When your entitlement starts
• The rules that often catch parents by surprise

Whether you’re expecting your first child, planning your return to work or already paying nursery fees, understanding what’s available can make a real difference.

Comment CHILDCARE and I’ll send you my free guide covering funded childcare hours, Tax-Free Childcare and other support available.

Save this post so you’ve got it when you need it, and follow Victoria Whittington for more practical tips to help your family make the most of the financial support available.

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