Of course you can! You do not need to appoint us or another consultant to find out if your manager is doing a decent job or not. It’s very straightforward to do yourself, so long as you know what questions to ask. These are the steps we would follow:

1. Obtain from your current investment manager their performance to the most recent quarter end, net of all costs, over 1, 3 and 5 years on an annualised basis (ie what the annual return was each year, not the cumulative return).

2. You should also ask for the 3 year volatility figure (usually about 10% for a long term fund).

3. Finally, request the fee rate you are paying on an ‘OCF’ basis (Ongoing Charge Figure - accept no other basis). Any competent manager will understand this easily and have the data readily available.

4. Go to the Charity Intelligence website and from the Investment Performance tab download the investment report ending on the same quarter and compare your data to those of other mixed asset funds.

   • If you are in the middle of the pack that is a satisfactory outcome.

   • An extra step is to find in the same report the list of the managers the volatility of their returns. Your returns should be similar (or better ) than those of managers who have a similar level of volatility to yours.

   • Finally, compare the total costs you are paying against the published fund rates. Start asking questions if the OCF is over 1%.

5. Don’t forget that the service and reporting you get from your manager also counts. All charities and trustees will be different in this respect so assessing this is subjective.

6. Write a report summarising your data, and add in comments about service levels, responsible investing standards and give it to your trustees!

If you do decide you would like a more experienced hand to help you, please do get in touch.