The Financial Health Check

Managing day-to-day finances is about as complex as changing the oil in a car – with some skill and instruction we can manage it, but there’s a good chance we’ll wind up with a big mess of black gunk everywhere. For the messy task of changing oil, most of us choose to hire a trained specialist like a mechanic at Jiffy Lube. For the essential task of managing finances, many of us choose to hire financial services specialists, though most of the time they only serve the wealthy. For a hefty fee, private bankers handle all the forms, phone calls, opening and closing of accounts, and movement of money involved in complex transactions. The client must do little more than sign documents and make a few choices.

Low- and middle-income households ought to have at least the same level of banking services as the rich; they may even need more, but what they commonly have access to is nothing like the private banking services available to the wealthy. They can get full financial service from credit counseling agencies, but only if they need remedial help digging out from under a mountain of debt. The rest of the financial advice available to them is just that – advice. It’s like going into a Jiffy Lube to get a one-hour lesson on how to change the oil in your car and then having to do it yourself in your garage. In other words, the only time a trained mechanic will really help you is if your engine blows up after you made a small mistake changing the oil on your own. Counselors and financial educators teach financial concepts, help clients make a budget, and then leave them with a lot of “homework,” and getting a wrong answer on it has perilous financial consequences. Clients must go home and open savings accounts, pay off debts, set up savings plans, cut up credit cards, and take any number of actions that are usually complex, often require self-control, are sometimes daunting, and are always tedious.

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