Integrated WealthCare is a multi-specialty wealth management firm, serving the unique needs of physicians and medical professionals. They have over fifteen years of experience guiding physicians in the development of personal financial success, designing benefit programs for practices and academic medical centers, and implementing national financial solutions for medical associations.
We had the opportunity to sit down with Kelly Knight, Director of Operations. Kelly has been with the firm since 2015 and is also the “go-to” when it comes to processing financial planning agreements. Read on to learn more about their business and use of AdvicePay in particular.
Q: What led you to sign up for AdvicePay?
Kelly: We had a horrible experience with both Quickbooks and also a larger, well-known financial institution. After setting up with Quickbooks and running two cycles of payment processing, we were kicked off without warning. So, in April of 2019, we signed up with the larger financial institution but were then denied access due to our business model not being acceptable. I was completely transparent with both vendors about what we do and what we were using their merchant services for. Both said it was fine during the signup process and then, all of a sudden, it wasn't. We couldn’t even log in to access our historical information. Essentially, they get you to sign up, charge you the signup fee, and then back out suddenly without warning.
Q: When looking for a solution what was your selection process?
Kelly: We did not want to be spending $200-300 a month when the majority of our merchant processing happens on a quarterly basis. My goal was to find something that was secure for our clients and made them comfortable but made us comfortable too. With our previous solution, our clients filled out a form and signed it, leaving us in a position of inputting that personal data. So, I went to our compliance advisors, who help us with our compliance oversight, thinking surely they know someone. They highly recommended AdvicePay. I talked with Cassie and after viewing a demo, got set up on AdvicePay.
Q: What are some of your favorite features in AdvicePay?
Kelly: We really like the ability to go in and customize the emails to our clients so they know it’s coming from us. It also allows us to add necessary disclosures to the emails, which is great from a compliance standpoint. We like the ability to send payment reminder emails to our clients, etc., it has worked really well for us. Additionally, AdvicePay takes the liability off of us to not have to deal with the client’s financial information. Allowing the client to log in and pay without us seeing their payment information is huge asset.
Q: How have your clients reacted to using AdvicePay?
Kelly: They seem to really like it! It’s very convenient for them to update their card information without having to call me if their card expired or if they had to get a new one. They can also go in and change their payment method entirely, if they’d like, at any point.
Q: What would you tell others who are considering using AdvicePay?
Kelly: Don’t bother with trying to set up with any other merchants. If you have investments/assets under management, at some point someone is going to figure that out at the institution and throw up a red flag. You could lose all of your history and data from your client payments because they will lock you out of the system. It happened to us with both QuickBooks and the larger financial institution mentioned previously. It is important that you have a partner in merchant services that understands what you do and the security requirements for our industry, and also the need for simplicity and convenience. It’s imperative that our merchant solution makes our clients feel at ease when utilizing it. AdvicePay is the only merchant we found that checks all those boxes, and there is no danger of me logging in and all of a sudden not having access to our account.
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In her role, Shannon oversees all aspects of AdvicePay’s marketing and brand communications. Her experience in marketing for continuing education and tech companies means that she’s both a learner and a teacher through her work. When she’s not using her creative skills to help folks learn about AdvicePay and how to get the most out of it, you can find her kayaking, camping, and trying out new recipes with her husband. Born in Baltimore, she’s still an avid Raven’s fan, cheering from Montana.