Most advisors know roughly how many households they expect to move. Far fewer know how many forms that means, or how many hours of operations work sit behind it. That gap is how a transition team ends up working nights in week three. This module shows you how to size the paperwork before you start, so you can staff for it, or hand it off, instead of finding out the hard way.
Count accounts, not households
Households are how you think about your book. Accounts are how the paperwork works. Every account usually needs its own new-account application and its own transfer form, and many households have several accounts: a joint brokerage account, an IRA for each spouse, maybe a Roth, a trust, or a custodial account for a grandchild. A book of a couple of hundred households can easily turn into many hundreds of accounts.
On top of the per-account forms, each household typically signs a new advisory agreement, and some need extra documents such as trust certifications, beneficiary designations or account-specific disclosures.
Not every account moves the same way
Most brokerage and IRA accounts at major firms can move by ACAT, the automated system that moves accounts between broker-dealers and custodians. ACAT transfers are standardized and tend to be the most predictable part of the move. Other assets take more handling:
- Non-ACAT transfers: assets held directly at a mutual fund company, a bank or a trust company, which need their own forms and often a medallion signature guarantee or a letter of authorization.
- Annuities and insurance products: usually handled separately with the carrier, and sometimes left in place.
- Employer plans: 401(k) and 403(b) rollovers go through the plan administrator's own process.
- Positions that can't move as-is: proprietary funds or products the new custodian can't hold, which may need a decision with the client before the transfer.
You don't need a precise number for each. A reasonable estimate of what share of accounts will need extra handling is enough to plan around.
Plan for rework
Some paperwork will come back not in good order. That's normal, and it's worth planning for. Each rejection means working out what went wrong, getting a corrected form signed, and resubmitting. How often it happens depends on your process. The next module covers how to keep it low.
Estimate your workload
Plug in your own numbers. The defaults are placeholders to show how the estimate works, not benchmarks. Replace them with your book and your team's real pace. If you've run a transition before, your own records are the best source.
Tool: Transition Workload Estimator
Joint, IRAs, Roths, trusts, custodial accounts — count them all.
Non-ACAT transfers, annuities, plan rollovers, positions that can't move as-is. Counted as roughly double the work.
Preparing forms, sending for signature, checking and submitting. The default is an illustrative example — use your team's real pace.
Share of accounts you expect to come back not in good order at least once. Illustrative default — not a benchmark.
Finding the problem, getting a corrected form signed, resubmitting.
Estimated operations workload
361 hours
375
accounts to move
956
forms and agreements, roughly
38
hours of NIGO rework (38 accounts)
9
weeks of one person's full-time work
Most of this lands in the weeks right after you announce. A Paperwork Check Agent reviews each form before it's submitted, and an Account Transfer Agent tracks every transfer and flags rejections the day they happen, so your team spends that time with clients instead of on custodian portals.
Results are illustrative and based only on your inputs; the defaults are examples, not industry benchmarks. Accounts = households × accounts per household. Forms = 2 per account (new-account application and transfer form) + 1 per account needing extra handling + 1 advisory agreement per household. Hours = accounts × minutes per account, with extra-handling accounts counted twice, plus NIGO accounts × minutes per rework. Weeks assumes a 40-hour week. Actual forms vary by custodian, account type and household.
What to do with the number
If the estimate is more hours than your team has in the weeks after you announce, you have three options: stretch the timeline, add temporary help, or hand the repetitive parts to agents. The Paperwork Check Agent reviews each form before it's submitted, and the Account Transfer Agent tracks every transfer and flags rejections, so your people spend their time on clients rather than custodian portals.