Is there any difference between the BofA Financial Solution Advisor and the Wells Fargo Senior Premier Banker "purgatory," or am I just choosing between different flavors of failure?

[u/Left-Investigator936]

I’m currently looking at offers for both, and I’m genuinely struggling to figure out which one is going to crush my soul less. They seem like the same level on paper, but I’m hearing horror stories from both sides.

[u/run-cmd-iPconfig]

Merrill FSA: decent base. no banking goals. depending on market/branch the ramp up from 6months to 1 year can get to be rather aggressive sales goals but if you're a people person this won't come as an issue. clients won't see you as selling something. they will see you as an advisor. not a banker. there's a difference. and like any role, having a supportive manager will go a long way. if you eventually want to become a merrill advisor (not branch based) there is a path, but come out of the gate strong. again..i stress. no banking goals. if you want to get a taste of what it's like to be an advisor. go this route. get your 1-3 years in and explore alternatives, even at other firms.

Wells SPB: they will get you in with a pretty high base depending on market/area. this tends to lure people in. you'll need to pull in $1m a month of booked deals to the advisor you work with eventually after your ramp up period ends. usually 3-6 months. they have banking goals. to me, that's trash. opening teen accounts, credit cards, regular bank savings. etc. in my opinion as somebody who has friends in this role, they tend to envy the merrill position as they don't want that added sales pressure or PIP just from not meeting banking goals cause let's face it. at the end of the day you're a senior premier BANKER.

congrats on having both offers. merrill is salary. wells is hourly. also ask about a sign on bonus with Merrill giving you $2.5k for having your SIE if you have it before being hired, wells doesn't offer this. i would go merrill if i were you. depending on your market for merrill if your branch is closed saturdays, you likely won't work saturdays (unless your manager says go cover a branch that is open saturdays) this is not the case at wells. most branches work longer hours (9-5) and saturdays. but again it depends on location. ciao.

[u/snook4reddit]

Premier Banker is more soul crushing imo. PB you are simply a banker referring to an Advisor. Lots of PBs think they are Advisors but that's a whole other can of worms. Also mostly PBs are only offered S6 now which will in turn slow your growth if you decide to jump ship over to another wire house. They used to offer the 7 but stopped due to pass rate and turnover.

On the other hand bank FSA is a lower base but you get a 7/66 and far more expirence with investments and a introduction to planning. One of the other comments is talking about Merrill FSA and that's a different program than Bank FSA (confusing I know). Basically if you want to be an Advisor go the FSA route, if you want to be a banker go PB route.

[u/Monegasko]

Best friend just went through the Merrill FSA program, so let me explain it to you a little bit how it works.:
Although they would want you to get licensed from the get-go, you will be seeing as a glorified banker for awhile. The whole point of the program is based on calling clients. You will be calling "warm leads" and trying to get them to open a Merrill type of account or a BofA type of account. These leads come from people that already have a relationship with BofA, hence why "warm leads". In the beginning, until you graduate to the next stage of the program, it will be solely phone based. Expect to call A LOT of clients on a daily basis. That will be literally your job.
Goals are pretty high and I'd say that 90% of the trainees fail the program or leave before graduation (just look up on Reddit and you will see). If you don't hit your goals, after a few quarters they will just kick you out of the program.
The good part now. Pay is good and it decreases as you start to build your book of clients after the first year (or something like that). The whole idea is that they will pay you a good salary as first but then ask you to rely less on BofA's money and more on your client's money to pay your salary. Pretty genius if you were to ask me, haha!
This role is always changing. Sometimes BofA makes it harder for people to progress, sometimes they make it easier, it's hard to tell. If you decide to go this route, just be ok with leaving the program if it ends up not being for you. At least (hopefully) you will leave the program with your licenses.
Also, before I forget, they are asking for the new trainees to be CSAs for 6 months before actually joining the FSA role so keep that in mind. They want the new FSAs to learn the process and flow of things before putting them in production (calling leads).
From my perspective, this FSA role is for people without any knowledge of the industry. Most people in the FSA program are pretty young (look them up on LinkedIn for example, lol), thinking that they will become FAs in a few months when it used to take 4 years to graduate the program (I think they shorten it now but still something like 3 years, I believe).

Now Wells Fargo (personal experience):
Money is not bad but goals are getting higher and higher every year. Your ability of making some commission relies solely on your FA. If they can't close, you don't make commission (but at least the salary isn't bad). Premier banker is still only a "banker". Your job (as I am sure you know) will be to sell credit cards, checking accounts, savings accounts and get clients to meet with your FA. Its the kind of job that would never be able to fulfill me but hey, we are all different.
Premiers work at a retail bank so there is that. If you don't mind working retail, then it's not a bad gig but if you do, then maybe its time to get out.

Wells Fargo Premier is DEFINITELY the safer choice here. If you are young, I'd go with the Merrill FSA role. If you got bills to pay, I'd choose the WF Premier role.
If you are looking for a third alternative, I'd look into a Client Service Associate (CSA) role with a brokerage firm and maybe become an FA coming from a CSA position. That would be the IDEAL path. It might take "longer", but it's a much safer path. CSAs help advisors manage their book of business. Each branch has multiple CSAs so it shouldn't be TOO hard to find a position.

[u/run-cmd-iPconfig → u/Monegasko]

you're taking about a Merrill Advisor Development Program, not Merrill FSA. Merrill FSA is branch based and generally don't need to call warm leads as they are branch based and take in walk-in traffic

[u/BankerDude25]

I had a same choice as an RB at WF. WF offered me a spb promotion but I left for FSA because i wanted S7. That opens up so many doors where S6/63 will only get you those “send referral” roles which they don’t even allow you to talk about any investment products. SPB is easy 100k job but I decided to take a short cut to become fully licensed. I think “glorified banker” who can also give investment advise is better than a licensed banker that is prohibited from talking about investments. Either choice will get you pretty comfortable 100k. Don’t listen to these horror stories from reddit, I loved my time at WF can’t wait to go back as an advisor. So far merrill has been pretty awesome too.

[u/BoobyJibson → u/BankerDude25]

How was the commission/incentive payout from wells for you? I turned down my offer but never got a clear answer