How to Check If Your Advisor Is a Fiduciary in 15 Minutes

Look the firm up on the SEC's adviser database, read its Form ADV brochure and Form CRS, then ask in writing which of your accounts the duty covers.

That is the whole check, and it takes about fifteen minutes. The reason most people never do it is that they assume the answer is in the title on the business card. It is not. "Financial advisor," "wealth manager," and "retirement planner" are marketing titles, not regulatory statuses. The status lives in public filings, and the filings are free to read.

How do you check if your advisor is a fiduciary, step by step?

Five steps. None of them require calling anyone or asking permission.

Step 1: Search the firm on the SEC's adviser database

Go to adviserinfo.sec.gov, the Investment Adviser Public Disclosure system. Search the firm name. The database covers both SEC-registered advisers and state-registered advisers, so if the firm manages a smaller asset base and registers with its home state rather than the SEC, you will still find it there.

Search the individual too. Firms register. People are listed as investment adviser representatives of a firm. If your advisor's name does not appear connected to the firm you thought you hired, that is worth a direct question.

Step 2: Open Form ADV Part 2A and read three items

Part 2A is the plain-English brochure. An investment adviser is required to deliver it to you, and it is posted publicly alongside the registration record. Most of it is boilerplate. Three items are not:

• Fees and compensation. How the firm is paid. Percentage of assets, flat fee, hourly, or some combination. Whether anyone at the firm receives compensation from anywhere other than you.
• Other financial industry activities and affiliations. This is where you learn if the firm is also a broker-dealer, owns an insurance agency, or is affiliated with a product manufacturer.
• Disciplinary information. Regulatory actions, if any exist.

You are not auditing the firm. You are looking for the shape of the business and whether the person across the table has already told you what is in there.

Step 3: Read Form CRS

Form CRS is the two-page relationship summary that firms serving retail investors must provide. It states the services offered, the fees, the conflicts, and the standard of conduct in language a regulator forced to be short. It also includes suggested questions to ask. Ask them.

Step 4: Check BrokerCheck for dual registration

FINRA's BrokerCheck at brokercheck.finra.org shows broker-dealer registration for firms and individuals. If your advisor appears in both systems, the person is dually registered. Again: common, legal, and not by itself a problem. It simply means the answer to "are you a fiduciary" is "on some accounts, and here is which ones."

Step 5: Get the answer in writing, account by account

The single best question goes past "are you a fiduciary?" Ask: "Which of my accounts are advisory accounts, and will you confirm in writing that you act as a fiduciary on those accounts at all times?" The account-by-account framing removes the ambiguity that a yes-or-no question leaves behind.

The title on the business card tells you nothing. The filings tell you everything, and they take fifteen minutes to read.

What are you actually checking for?

Registration as an investment adviser is what carries the fiduciary duty under the Investment Advisers Act, a duty of care and loyalty that spans the whole advisory relationship. Regulation Best Interest applies to a broker-dealer when it makes a recommendation. The filings tell you which one governs each account. For what the two standards require, see what is a fiduciary advisor and fiduciary vs Reg BI.

Investment adviser

A firm or person registered with the SEC or a state to provide investment advice for compensation. Owes a fiduciary duty on advisory accounts.

Investment adviser representative (IAR)

The individual who gives the advice on behalf of a registered advisory firm. The firm holds the registration; the IAR is listed under it.

Form ADV Part 2A

The narrative brochure an adviser must deliver to clients, describing services, fees, conflicts, affiliations, and disciplinary history.

Form CRS

A short relationship summary describing services, fees, conflicts, and standard of conduct, required for firms serving retail investors.

Dually registered

A firm or individual registered as both an investment adviser and a broker-dealer, or associated with both. Different accounts can carry different obligations.

Which document tells you what?

What if your advisor is registered as both?

Dual registration is a structural fact, not a warning sign, and it changes the question you need to ask. On an advisory account, the fiduciary duty applies at all times. On a brokerage account, the best interest obligation attaches when a recommendation is made. Both are real obligations. The failure people run into is not being told which of their accounts is which, and therefore not knowing what applied to the advice they received last quarter.

So make the map explicit. List your accounts. Next to each one, write which side of the house it sits on and how the firm is compensated for it. If your advisor cannot produce that list quickly, the list is the problem, not the answer.

Where do insurance and annuities fit?

They sit outside the Advisers Act. Life insurance, long-term care coverage, and annuities are regulated by state insurance departments under state best-interest standards for annuity recommendations, and they are typically compensated by commission from the issuing carrier rather than by an advisory fee.

That is worth saying out loud because it is where the confusion usually starts. A firm can owe a fiduciary duty on your advisory accounts and still be commission compensated when it places an insurance policy. Anchor is in exactly that position, and we disclose it. Anchor operates as a fiduciary under the Investment Advisers Act. Insurance placed through our carrier relationships is commission compensated. Both facts are true at once, and you are entitled to hear both from anyone you hire.

Questions worth asking out loud

• Which of my accounts are advisory accounts?
• Will you confirm in writing that you act as a fiduciary on those accounts at all times?
• How are you paid on each account, and does anyone else pay you in connection with my plan?
• Are you or your firm also registered as a broker-dealer, or affiliated with an insurance agency?
• Can I have your Form ADV Part 2A and Form CRS today?
• Who reads my tax return, and who talks to my CPA and my attorney?

That last one is a coordination question rather than a registration question, and it is the one that separates a coordinated plan from a portfolio. Registration status tells you what standard governs the advice. It does not tell you whether anyone is connecting your tax picture, your income plan, your insurance, and your estate documents. For how that coordination is supposed to work, see coordinating your CPA, advisor, and attorney, and for how the structures differ, multi-family office vs financial advisor.

Frequently asked questions

Is there one website that answers whether my advisor is a fiduciary?

The closest single source is the SEC's Investment Adviser Public Disclosure site at adviserinfo.sec.gov. It confirms whether the firm and the individual are registered as an investment adviser, which is what carries the Advisers Act fiduciary duty. It will not tell you which of your specific accounts are advisory accounts, so you still need that answer in writing from the firm.

Does a CFP or CPA credential make someone a fiduciary?

Professional credentials carry their own conduct standards set by the issuing body, which is not the same thing as the fiduciary duty that attaches to registration under the Investment Advisers Act. Check the credential and the registration separately. They answer different questions.

My advisor said yes when I asked if they were a fiduciary. Is that enough?

It is a starting point, not documentation. Ask for the answer in writing, specific to your accounts, and read the Form ADV Part 2A alongside it. A verbal yes and a written account-by-account confirmation are very different records if a dispute ever arises.

Is a commission a conflict of interest?

It is a conflict, which is why it has to be disclosed. Conflicts exist in every compensation model, including asset-based advisory fees. The standard is disclosure and management, not the absence of conflicts. What you are looking for is whether the conflicts were told to you before you had to ask.

What if I cannot find the firm on either database?

Ask for the firm's CRD number and the exact legal entity name, which often differs from the brand name on the door. If the entity still does not appear in either system after that, ask directly what the firm is registered as and by whom, and do not proceed until you have a clear answer.

How often should I recheck?

Once a year is reasonable, and always after a firm is acquired, changes its name, or changes its affiliations. Registration status, affiliations, and disciplinary history all change over time, and the filings are updated to reflect it.

Sources

1. SEC Investment Adviser Public Disclosure (IAPD), the public search tool for SEC-registered and state-registered investment advisers and their representatives.
2. FINRA BrokerCheck, the public record for broker-dealer firms and registered individuals, used here to identify dual registration.
3. 17 CFR 275.204-3, the rule requiring an investment adviser to deliver its Form ADV Part 2A brochure to clients.
4. 17 CFR 240.15l-1 (Regulation Best Interest), which imposes the best interest obligation at the time a recommendation is made to a retail customer.
5. SEC Release IA-5248, Commission Interpretation Regarding Standard of Conduct for Investment Advisers, describing the fiduciary duty that spans the entire adviser-client relationship.