Financial Advisor Client Onboarding Checklist (Wealthbox Edition)

Onboarding a new client is the highest-stakes interaction in an advisory relationship. First impressions are formed, expectations are set, and the operational foundation for years of future interaction is laid — all in the first few weeks. Getting your Wealthbox setup right from the start determines how smoothly everything else runs.

Here's a complete checklist for new client onboarding in Wealthbox, organized by phase.

Phase 1: Wealthbox record setup (before the first meeting)

The moment a prospect agrees to become a client, start the Wealthbox record. Don't wait until after the first meeting — the first meeting generates documentation that needs to be attached to an existing contact record.

Create the contact record. Full legal name, email, phone, address. Use the same name format across all your contacts (First Last — not inconsistent capitalization or nicknames unless noted separately).

Create or update the household. If the client has a spouse or partner who will be part of the relationship, create a household in Wealthbox and link both contacts. This matters for how notes, tasks, and meetings display — household-level views show activity across both contacts.

Complete the core profile fields. Don't leave these blank and plan to fill them in later — you won't. At minimum: date of birth, employment status, approximate income range, marital status, life stage. These fields power your segmentation and prep briefs later.

Set the client type and status. In Wealthbox, mark the contact as a Client (not Prospect or Lead) from the moment the engagement begins. Set the client since date. This matters for any filtering you do by client tenure.

Add initial tags. Apply your service tier tag (if you tier clients), plus any relevant life stage or planning focus tags you use. You can always add more — but starting tagged means your segments stay accurate from day one.

Phase 2: Onboarding workflow trigger

If you have a Wealthbox workflow template for new client onboarding — and you should — trigger it immediately after creating the contact record.

A good onboarding workflow template includes:

• Task: Send client agreement and fee disclosure (due: day 1)
• Task: Schedule discovery meeting (due: day 2)
• Task: Collect completed client profile form (due: day 5)
• Task: Open accounts and initiate transfers (due: day 7, as applicable)
• Task: Schedule 30-day check-in call (due: day 14)
• Task: Confirm all accounts funded and documents signed (due: day 21)
• Task: Move client to "Active" status (due: day 30)

These tasks appear in your Wealthbox dashboard with due dates. You're not tracking onboarding in a spreadsheet or from memory — it's all in the CRM, visible, overdue-flagged if something slips.

Phase 3: Discovery meeting documentation

The first substantial meeting with a new client — typically the discovery or fact-finding meeting — generates the most important documentation you'll create in the relationship. Get it right from the start.

Log the meeting using the four-section note structure. Topics discussed (goals, current situation, concerns), decisions made (engagement scope, priorities), action items (what both sides committed to), next steps (upcoming meetings, pending decisions).

Document the planning objectives. What is this client actually trying to accomplish? Retirement income by 60, education funding for two kids, business sale planning, estate transfer? Capture it clearly in the contact's notes and update the relevant Wealthbox fields. This becomes the context for every future meeting.

Record the risk profile conversation. Note the risk tolerance discussion explicitly — not just the number from a questionnaire, but what the client said about how they'd feel during a 30% market decline. This context matters when markets move and you need to revisit the conversation.

Phase 4: First-month contact fields to complete

By the end of the first month, your Wealthbox contact record for a new client should have all of these completed:

• Contact information (complete, verified)
• Date of birth, retirement age target
• Household structure and all linked contacts
• Employment and income range
• Life stage and planning objectives
• Risk tolerance (field + note context)
• Accounts linked or in progress
• Service tier tag
• Next scheduled meeting date
• First meeting note attached

A contact record that has all of these fields is genuinely useful. You open it before a meeting and you know the client — their situation, their objectives, what you've discussed, what's pending. A contact record with half these fields leaves you reconstructing from memory every time.

The automation angle

The onboarding checklist above is the target. Getting there consistently requires a workflow that runs automatically rather than one you remember to trigger. With Fingale connected to Wealthbox, the first meeting note populates the four-section structure automatically from your voice note, the onboarding workflow tasks are triggered, and the follow-up email is drafted — all from a 90-second recording immediately after the discovery meeting.

The checklist becomes something the system executes, not something you check off manually. That's when onboarding reliably produces the same quality output for every new client, regardless of how busy the week is when they come on board.