What Is a Client Portal and Why Your Family Office Should Be Using One [Explained in Less Than 400 Words]

A List of Five Client Portal Benefits for Family Offices

From a fintech perspective, a client portal is a digital tool used to present an individual’s total net worth and overall financial position.

More often than not, client portals are accessible as a standalone website or mobile app that provides an on-demand snapshot of an individual’s holdings. Most client portals use a combination of reporting elements like tables, graphs and supplemental documents to present the information in an easy-to-consume fashion.

Depending on the power of the underlying family office software and the completeness of the data, client portals can include simple data points like total account value, asset allocation and account value history, as well as more complex analytics like performance, risk and nested – or multi-layered – ownership values.

Although client portals tend to be more widely embraced by family offices working with Gen X and Millennials given their always-on, at-your-fingertips nature, they can also be beneficial for family offices serving older generations.

[Read Best Practices to Transition Your Family Office into the Age of Digital Reporting]

This has become increasingly evident given the widespread adoption of remote work environments in 2020, particularly as family offices are seeking to digitize specific processes like bill payment approvals and recurring report delivery.

In this new paradigm where physical distance is being supplemented by digital technologies, client portals are becoming an invaluable asset in the client service toolkit.

So what are the core benefits of using a client portal in your family office? Here’s our shortlist:

1. Customized Client Experience

A well-designed client portal will offer family offices the ability to deliver a personalized client experience for each family member using configurable dashboards, custom data groupings and optional functionality

2. Frictionless Client Engagement

Allow family members to seamlessly participate in family office operations like bill payment approvals using an intuitive, elegant solution designed specifically with the end-client in mind

3. Secure Data Sharing

Client portals use encrypted data and multi-level security protocols to reduce the risk associated with sharing highly-sensitive financial information between family office staff and end-clients

4. Self-Service Access

Clients can access financial reporting and investment insights on-demand without requiring a phone call or email exchange with your family office team

5. Digital Document Storage

In addition to on-screen reporting, many client portals feature document repositories where you can easily share monthly or quarterly reporting as well as other third-party documents

In short, client portals help alleviate manual touchpoints and simplify how family offices communicate financial information to their end-clients.

Ready to explore a client portal for your family office?

Check out the Archway Client Portal to discover how the Archway Platform^SM and its digital reporting tools can help your family office modernize its financial reporting operations and deliver an engaging, interactive reporting experience to your end-clients.