The IMG Doctor Who Walked Into the 60% Tax Trap — And How She Got Out

So you either have to save, live within your means, or if there's trouble— because there's always times when you need, either you're not working or something happens or there's an extra— so if you don't have any savings, then you have to beg, borrow, or steal. Beg, borrow, or steal. Okay.

The system is very robust, isn't it? It's so well organized. It's all digital. It's all— you get everything, um, in the, uh, from the websites and everything. I thought everything is getting adjusted and calculated and everything. Unfortunately, it's not That way.

No, it's not. Now, moving from India to the UK 6 years ago, almost 6 years now, what were the big differences you saw in terms of the finances, financial systems? Many doctors I speak to, they hadn't never invested. Like in our financial health survey, over 1,500 doctors have done that. 60% don't invest in stocks, bonds, or anything at all, but over 70% are saving. Content is everywhere, but context is not plentiful. There's a lot of information, but there's no accountability.

Start as early as possible. Understand the fact that there is no free meal. So if every income, there is a tax. So you starting early will help, will give you, will make you be ahead of the race. These are the basic things that any doctor should be, um, aware of, or should be, should be able to— at least they don't need to be expert in all the numbers and everything. They just have to know what to look, where to look, and what it means.

Yeah, so Dr. Renuka Rangan, um, NHS consultant emergency medicine physician. It's been so much fun Talking to you in the last day, I'll say we've gone beyond 90 minutes. So if someone is just watching this podcast, can you tell them in a nutshell what we've discussed and what they're going to learn just from listening to this podcast?

They learn what mistakes that I did to avoid, number one. Number two is, uh, what are the basic things that as a doctor that you, uh, knowing about investments and knowing about taxes will help. Which, okay, how many hundreds or how many thousands you can save. That's the second thing. Third thing is why it is so difficult in every step, because though, uh, though it all sounds very straightforward with your self-assessment form and SIP account and trading account and, you know, all your investment account, each of those accounts, before you start, you need information from, say, HMRC or some login from HMRC. You your pension statement from your business service authority. So, so many mini steps are there which nobody talks about. So I think listening to the podcast will make them realize that it's all time-consuming, though it's all— those are the deterrent factors for any doctor to step into this journey. But once you start into it, you will understand that once that's done, just it's one-time thing you will be in for a roller coaster ride.

Wow. So if you are listening to this and you are in for a roller coaster ride, just continue and you're going to get some insights from Dr. Ndubuisi 'Ndubuisi' Ndubuisi.

Right. Hi, welcome back again to the Moneywise Doctor podcast. Most times it's just me giving you financial tips on how to make smarter financial decisions and avoid doing dumb things with money. But every now and then I've got someone interesting who joins me, and today I'm joined by Dr. Renuka Rangan. Dr. Renuka Rangan is an NHS consultant in emergency medicine, and just like me, she's an IMG doctor. So she moved to the UK in 2020, so that's almost 6 years now, and within that period she's managed to sort of like first work in a, in a role and then became a consultant in the NHS. And most interestingly, Dr. Renuka has been to my investing academy at Moneywise Doctor Deep Dive and my mastermind. Um, she has a very interesting story, and I'm delighted to have her today in the studio. Welcome, Dr. Renuka.

Thank you, Andy.

Excellent. Right, so it's, it's very interesting. Basically, I, I see the journey of IMG doctors. Um, it is quite a type of person who says, well, back home I've done all this, I've become— I'm working at the specialist level, and now I'm going to move to a new country and do it all over again despite all the challenges and all that. So basically, if someone is jumping into this podcast at this point and they want to say, Dr. Reneka, tell me a little bit more about yourself. Just tell me, how would you describe yourself? I know I've tried to do that already, but how would you describe yourself?

Well, thanks, Andy. I mean, I think your introduction was pretty in detail. I, like you mentioned, I am an IMG doctor. I'm from India. Um, I did my training, I was working as a specialist in A&E over there. So after that, uh, my husband and I, we decided to move to the UK in 2020. Um, so since then, initially we started as, uh, working as Trust Grade Registrars in A&E, and then, uh, eventually I got into training and then finished my training here and became a consultant. So that's in short for you.

Wow, that sounds like A&E, just brief, no time for long histories and all that. So that's like two doctors moved from India to the UK. That's really a big gain. And then, so what was sort of the motivation? What was the drive? What led to that move? I know, I know, for instance, I moved to the UK to come do my master's, and then I decided to eventually go back to clinical work. In your case, what was the goal? What led to that?

I think at that point we were both curious to see what is there UK has to offer because we had completed our membership exams by then. We were both MRChem certified at that time, so I want to know, okay, uh, next is fellowship. But to do, uh, at that point I guess we did not have provision to do it back home or something like that. Uh, if it is a chance to experience I mean, the guidelines and the, you know, the protocols that we actually study for the exams to be practiced on a day-to-day basis. So that was exciting for us, and I think that made us take the decision, okay, if we are doing the fellowship, it's better to be in the system and, you know, practice it on a daily basis and then gain some experience at the same time when you— when we are doing the fellowship.

Wow, that sounds super interesting. So basically you've already done your MRCEM. You had already done that. For those listening who don't know, that's a Member of Royal College of Emergency Medicine, right? So quite— yeah, you weren't just like a junior doctor starting when you came. You had skills already. That's fantastic. That's interesting. And 2020 was quite the time to move, isn't it? That was during the height of COVID I remember then I was in Cornwall. I just Rounding up my sort of residency training, my GP, my GP training at that point. Okay, that's good. And I'm very interested, for many doctors, one of the things we discuss on Moneywise Doctor Podcast is your journey, your financial journey, um, in terms of, yes, you've moved from a new country and now you're in a new country with the different rules. Even you knew your emergency medicine stuff already, you came to the NHS, you're learning new things about the terminologies, discharge to assess, TTO, all those kind of words. But there was another language, another world, which is the financial system. So, but I don't want us to start from the UK. I want to start from before you moved to the UK. What was your experience with your personal finance in terms of like saving or investing, or just your background, anything that influenced it, maybe your, your family or something like that?

The Scrubs Investing Workshop 3 Steps to Tax Efficient Investing for Medics. For the first time, I'm running it in this format, 90 minutes live with our team for doctors and dentists who want to actually build the system instead of just learning about it and letting time to just pass without doing anything. Inside, we'll cover how to think about the NHS pension versus the other options, how SIPPs work and when they make sense, how ISAs fit into the picture, how pension tax relief works in practice, how to think about your adjusted net income, and how to avoid the common tax-efficient investing mistakes like the one we've described. How looking at children, investing for children, how does that fit to overall plan? How to choose investments sensibly without taking unnecessary risk. You click the link in the description or in the first comment, or you comment Scrubs, you get the link.

I think family, the way the cultural background is very important, isn't it? In India, we believe, um, I believe everybody, um, I mean, all the IMG doctors would be, um, feeling the same, that we are all, um, sort of brought up in an environment where we know that we have to first think of saving rather than spending. And we all want, uh, would also have been brought up with the mindset that if there is an emergency, there is nothing on this earth like cash in hand. Okay, you should be able to afford that by yourself, and otherwise you will have to keep, you know, you might have to ask all your friends, request, you know, beg, borrow, steal at that point of time. So really stressful. And right from childhood, because of those attitude towards finance, both in my family and in all of like our surroundings, know that, we know for sure that, um, you know, not to be very extravagant, um, until you're financially secure, right?

Not to be unnecessary extravagant until you're financially secure. I'm going to come back to that because I know all my friends who are from India, when they're not extravagant, it doesn't come— it does in one area they can be extravagant, and that has to do with G-O-L-D, gold. I've had a number of Indian doctors pass through the Mastermind as well. And I know that they have this obsession, but I know they always have a bit of gold. No matter what investment they make, there's always a little bit of gold on the side. And like you said, it's cultural, isn't it? Yeah. Yeah. So we'll come back to that in a minute when we look at investing. But I like that. It's very interesting. So you don't have to save, live within your means. Or if there's trouble, because there's always times when you need— either you're not working or something happens or there's an extra. So if you don't have any savings, then you have to borrow, beg, borrow, or steal. Beg, borrow, or steal. Okay, I like that one. I'm gonna use that one. Beg, borrow, or steal, right? Okay, so now moving from India to the UK 6 years ago, almost 6 years now, what were the big differences you saw in terms of the finances, financial systems? I don't know, was like if In India, doctors are sort of like earning a lot of money and living quite big, and in the UK, they're different. And also the financial systems, I kind of like, like I'm originally from Nigeria, people can be quite, I'll save cash, you know, buy land property. People view the stock market with suspicion. And I was one of the few people who, like at the time, at 19, when I started investing, took time to understand it. And in a way, we don't mind if people don't want to invest in the stock market. It means we can find better bargains. Well, the different systems, India, UK, for what were the main differences you saw? Was it just more about the same, or—

actually, it's very different because I think there are strict rules in the UK where banks cannot give you, um, you know, direct advice on what investment to do. They can actually give you like some of the funds that are good to invest on, but they cannot basically tell you more about it or tell you like this is a scheme where you can invest and you will be able to do— they can't do that. There are strict rules like that. But in India you have different sort of different types of investments. There's like one, of course, you banks will also give you various avenues to invest. And then you have the fixed deposit, recurring deposits, which are— which have good interest. Like interest is good. Over here it's not. Your savings account, even savings account gets interest in India, but over here savings account don't give much interest. Most of the banks don't give interest as far as I know. I don't, I don't, I've not been with many banks, just one or two. So yeah, and other than that, of course, like you mentioned, many, we all, I stock market with suspicion, a lot of suspicion, is because we don't understand so many aspects. Unless you are, um, you know, in with the bank trading, bank or trading or investment, uh, stuff, you don't get a lot of exposure. So that's why people over there, uh, they're happy investing in real estate, buying a land, buying a property, um, buying gold or something which they can see, they can measure, they can feel. So rather than just, you know, looking at the system or looking at a screen and be happy with, okay, those numbers are going up, going down, some graph which is like, you know, the candles, the red and the green, nobody makes— it doesn't make any sense to a common man there. But even a common man will have savings there in forms of which what they can actually count and feel. So that's the real reason why stock market is a taboo subject for everyone. It's like, it all seems like very unreal. You can gain a lot, people can become millionaire, and 2 days later he can become a pop-up. Uh, it's very unreliable, isn't it? So I think it's time-tested. Many, many people have seen others fail more than win.

Yes.

Why they don't go into stock markets very easily.

Yes, that makes—

uh, somebody so experienced from investment banking comes and says, you know, this particular fund house is actually good and it's actually like this. So we rely— and again, that That is, that depends on the relationship between the customer and the bank. So most of the banks make sure that they have proper relation, um, with their customers, and they actually make sure that they, um, you know, they advise them or guide them properly, uh, so that they will keep coming back to them.

Yes, that's very interesting, isn't it? It's funny because I've got like a few friends and from India who are into investing, but I get the sense that that's not the general population, right? Um, yeah, the general population would basically— and it's fair, um, I don't know what India regulatory systems is, but in a place where, um, for instance, if I invest in a company in the US or UK, I'm looking at their income statement, their balance sheet, their cash flow statement, you know, the kind of thing that we learn in the Investing Academy. I'm looking at all that and I'm thinking, yeah, the numbers have been audited and they're like true. Not that there couldn't be fraud, but these are very unlikely. And I know that if there's fraud, someone is going to go to jail, right? So usually in different systems, like in some countries, not everyone is like, well, I don't really know what they're doing there. Yeah.

Because it is through good reliable banks. And that's why I said the pro— there must be, um, the bank must have proper credibility. It should, should be like, you know, it should have been there for many, many years, many years. Only when you trust those banks you actually go invest in them. And so once they do, and they are all audited, edited, and, um, they're all, they all follow, follow the strict, strict rules and regulations. Only after you— they make sure everything is okay, they go ahead with it. Initially they might accept, okay, we'll, we'll, um, you know, they may propose that you could probably invest in this, but even if you accept, only if things go through it will happen. And, uh, but to be fair, it's not a very, uh, difficult, uh, paperwork. Uh, yes, paperwork will happen. And, um, nowadays because it's all digitalized and it's all online and everything, uh, so everything is there in black and white. You can't just slip under the table or anything.

Fair enough.

So those things are all taken care of. I mean, there has been a lot of revolution around the digitalized banking in India. So I mean, those things have been happening over the last so many— I mean, I'd say 10 to 15 years it's been going on well. And but at that time when I changed over from there to here, So that's the jarring difference. I have nobody to, you know, suggest options for me for investment. I don't have— because, uh, obviously because I was spoon-fed in India. Yes, lazy now. I don't know what to invest in. I don't know what to do. So that basically, uh, and, and still the, um, you know, the fear about stock market is there because I've not made the effort to learn or do anything.

I understand.

And, uh, that was basically, uh, stopping me to take any step by myself. So that was not that I was a great investor in back home also. Uh, I was actually having millions and I was playing with money or anything, whatever, whatever, little bit, uh, what we wanted, whatever I was doing, it was based on, um, a lot of, um, somebody had already, uh, done the research and I would have examples of people who had done the same investments and have done and have seen profit or anything, and only then I would even invest, uh, even like, say, um, £5 worth money.

Some rupees. Yeah, I hear my Indian friends say lakhs. I don't know what that is, but they explain it to me. I keep forgetting, like a thousand something.

Uh, lakhs is, um, 100,000. 100,000.

100,000 lakhs. One lakh. Okay, that's good. So, so from what you're saying, Dr. Radhika, you'd already started investing before you came to the UK. You already had some investment experience, very minimal. Very minimal, but at least you started doing something because many doctors I speak to, they had never invested. Like in our Financial Health Survey, over 1,500 doctors have done that. 60% don't invest in stocks, bonds, or anything at all, but over 70% are saving. Like over 70% have savings and a good number have like savings including an emergency fund that can last them more than 3 months. And then we saw about 67% or thereabouts, can't remember the exact figures, are worried about their financial future. So they're worried that they wouldn't be able to retire at 65 or whatever age it is. And then, then I think 67% were worried and sort of like, felt financially behind for their age. So if you pair that with not investing, we all know that over the last century, the stock market has been like the best return in terms of investment. If you look at a long-term period, 10 years, 20 years, 30 years, so in the short while, um, money, gold or property might do a bit better. So that fear is always there, right? So you had already done some investing. What led you towards starting some? I know you said you hadn't done much, but what led you to that investing? Were there some examples there, like family members that were investing, or friends, or How did you even start thinking about investing rather than just working hard as a doctor, saving your money?

You mean in the UK or in India?

In India.

In India. So first I started with the safest option, okay, the least, uh, what was that?

Was that like bond, government bond?

No, it was a fixed deposit or a recurring deposit kind of thing. This was the, uh, safest option, and, uh, I had— I started the My first recurring deposit was when I was doing my A&E training, where I was saving monthly for my trip to Washington, D.C. So because I had like one month observership program over there, so forth, but I had to fund my travel and stay over there. So I didn't want to ask my dad to finance it. It was more like an ego issue, I think.

You want to— you didn't want to beg, borrow, or steal.

You can say that, but I just wanted to, you know, uh, try and see if I could manage things on my own. Of course my dad would have had, uh, it's not, uh, it was not at all something that I would doubt, uh, about, but it's something I wanted to see whether I could do it on my own. And that was my first, um, uh, what do you call that, first experience with any kind of proper savings. That was back in my, during my training time. And, uh, once I did that and I saw the stability and security that it gave me, uh, for my travel. I was able to book good, uh, you know, Emirates. I was able to book a good accommodation. I was able to, um, you know, travel within the country when I was there. So it was good, and I felt, okay, so this is something that I should do on a regular basis, was my mindset at that point. And then I started doing fixed deposit, uh, with a little bit of money that, like, you, you deposit a lump sum for a locked-in period of, like, so many years. 2 years or 3 years and you get like 6% to 7% interest, which is good again. Yes. So then came, uh, that's when the banks, when they, when you start doing all this kind of, uh, small, small savings, they start noticing you and then they will come right here like, Madam, do you, do you think that you will consider, uh, some investment like this? And that's how it started. And me being me, I always chose the very safest option. I said, listen, I'm not greedy, I don't want to become a millionaire overnight or anything. Safest. But even if it's a little bit interest, that's, uh, like a little bit profit out of it, I'm happy with it. That, that's, that was my mindset. Um, and, uh, so yeah, I've always, uh, been on the safer aspect of the, uh, you know, the scoring that you do to see how the risk tolerance—

I love it. What I, what I can see from here is, first of all, you said from saving towards a project Then you decided to make the saving a bit more habitual, regular, habitual. And then you decided to— then you are dipping your toes rather than just— some people just like a quick cut, they just jump into somewhere, then they lose all the money, then they make money overnight, then they lose all the money. But you are dipping your toes with saving. Then you save for a project, then you start saving habitually. Then you went for what we call low risk or low volatility fixed income assets. If you remember, you know, sort of like week 1 of the academy. So fixed income assets. So probably you put your money in fixed deposits. It could be like a Treasury bill. You didn't jump into stocks without understanding it. I didn't jump into crypto or anything crazy like that.

The only thing I did was—

Oh, did you?

No, no, no, no, not crypto. Because crypto is not legal in India. So we do not have that option. Thing.

Really?

No. So, um, um, I started doing mutual funds, which was one that they actually recommended from the bank. So only small, small, uh, amount. It's not, um, it's not in lakhs also, probably a few thousands. That's it, 1,000 Indian rupees, uh, to be more specific. So I didn't do my— I didn't— like I said, these are all like trial and error for me, and I wanted to know what it is, know how it would perform, to see what it is, and then take steps further. So, and then came life insurance, then came all these things. So, um, I mean, I, I had to diversify, um, around those areas because once you do a little bit of, um, funds, like, you know, like your mutual funds or your ETF or any, any investment, they'll say, uh, do you have a life insurance? Do you know who your money is? And all those talks come out.

Yeah.

Uh, yes, life insurance, I, I I didn't have a life insurance with, uh, when I started over there in India. And then they'll, uh, immediately they started asking, do you have retirement plans? I said, I'm just now starting, so I don't think—

I like, I like, it seems like it's one after the other, step after step. I don't know what it's like. I suspect they have like a very clear marketing plan, which is good. It got you started, isn't it? They got you started. I'm sure at that point what you were worried about was not the fees. Yeah, well, you're most, you're most important, I don't want to lose money. You weren't thinking of making the most returns, and I'm sure you weren't thinking, what are the fees? What is this bank charging me? You're just like, I'm happy that I'm making some returns, which, which is always where people start. Okay, that's good. So you said that, then you moved to the UK. When you moved to the UK, sort of like your financial journey, what was it like? You were working originally, you were working as, um, um, like a registrar level, the trust grade registrar, they say. Yeah. And then you, you, you then became a consultant. Obviously your income went up.

Yeah, after a year in, uh, working as a Trustee, I went into training.

Yeah, okay.

Yeah, the highest specialty training, and then I became the consultant.

So, wow, okay, good. Now tell me, in the UK, in terms of finance, what was different? What was the experience in terms of saving or investing or taxes, or what, what was your experience? I don't know, obviously you paid taxes in India as well. So in the UK, what was the experience of the financial system?

Opening a bank account was very easy.

Yes.

But then getting a credit card was very difficult. I mean, credit card with a good, um, amount, like, you know, a respectable amount to say, okay, you have monthly credit of this much, was a bit challenging. I was thinking, uh, I mean, uh, in my country, the credit card that I got when I started working was, uh, actually something for about, um, like say £1,500 over here. It was just in the beginning itself.

£1,500 already? It's— how much is £1,000 in rupees?

Uh, about a lakh, uh, one lakh, like 100,000.

Oh, okay. So that 1,000 is 1 to 100, the exchange rate, is it? So £1 could be ₹100. So ₹1,500 for a first credit card is quite sizable, isn't it?

Yeah, it was very easy to get that because you're a doctor there. They give a doctor— I got the doctor signature card and it was all, uh, I was surprised. Okay, I have so much, but I actually, I probably use only, um, you know, a few hundreds or a few, um, like few thousand. Not, uh, ₹1,500 I would be using, probably a few hundred £1,000 worth money only on a monthly basis over there. Over here, to get even £1,500 credit, uh, was actually a little bit difficult. Initially they gave me, I think, uh, if I remember correctly, initially they said they'll give about £1,000 credit card, and then after 2 weeks they called and said they're going to increase my credit limit to something, £2,000. So that itself was an— was like, whoa, okay, you don't get credit cards over here. Okay, fine. And then like I said, banks don't— when I spoke to the bank to ask if there's any, you know, fixed deposit scheme or any recurring deposit, there is, but the interest rate is not very interesting.

Yes. And you're kind of like when you're new in the country, you haven't got credit or anything. I don't think— I think I only got my first credit card as I was buying my first house just before then. And then you just— you're in a new system. You've never borrowed money, you've never repaid money. So you don't owe money, but someone who has bad credit is better than you, basically, because poor credit is better than— at that point, bad credit. But that was 6 years ago, and I'm sure you kind of like settled into the UK. Good. So you went from that point and you got to the point where you started thinking, well, the interest is not that great, and started thinking about investing and all that. So what was your investing journey so far?

Well, what happened was a lot of my amount was just in the savings account, my salary after the, you know, expenditure and, you know, car and all those things, there was a little bit of money that was there in the savings account. So towards March, towards the end of every financial year, the bank people call you, isn't it, to ask if there are so many schemes. Do you want to invest? Do you want to do this? Do you want to do that? So I had one such call with my bank person, and that's when I got— I realized that, okay, there's a LISA, there's an ISA, there's, uh, uh, there's ISA stocks and shares, there's cash ISA, So I got an idea of the so many things that are available, but again, they can only give you the options. You choose whatever you want. But then I was always having the inertia to do the execution step. I am aware of things, but I don't know how to, you know, do it. So again, that's when there was one of the— that's when I got introduced to a company. Yeah, like a financial company, which basically they say that they specialize, uh, in finances with— I don't want to tell the name of the company— or specializing in finances with the doctors, and they actually— their niche is basically doctors' investment.

I think I know the company. We're not gonna— okay, we're not gonna call their name. So let me just ask you a few questions. You can blink or tell me. Do they come to conferences? Do they show up in conferences and sort of like doctors' conferences? And they put in okay, and all they do, they kind of like specialize with doctors, right? Yeah, okay, uh, we won't call their names. I think I know who you might be talking with, but you know, we haven't got a big legal team here, so we don't want to be sued. So, so you've come in contact with this company and then they were going to help you with investing, right?

Yes.

So what was your experience so far?

Uh, I was so naive, or I would say I was so stupid, that I just went and said, okay, uh, I have no— I said I have no, um, I don't have any ABC of investments, investment knowledge in the UK, but I would like to, you know, speak about it, discuss, and I like to see what my options are. So what's the starting? So, um, they were very kind and they gave me an appointment for a free consultation where they actually, um, they actually, um made, made one of their financial consultants to give me, you know, give me all the options available with them to, through with that, through which I can invest and stuff like that. So that, that's when I was, at that point of time, I was trying to see, okay, though I have been working like 4 years, but until then, though I was aware that there is something like the ISA stuff and all, but I was not sure whether making use of ISA or tax-free allowance is going to make any difference to me, or is it really worth it. And I didn't bother about tax relief because my— anyway, my salary was less than ₹100,000, so it was not actually affecting or anything. I was like happy with whatever, uh, HMRC was doing. As— was doing a wonderful job where everything is deducted at source, and whatever they give My culture has taught me to, you know, live within your whatever you've been given with. So it was actually fine. I was not having a luxurious life, but I was okay.

Yeah.

So, and I didn't have to face any issues or anything at that point of time. So all I had was like a few thousand, whichever, whatever is getting saved. I thought, okay, if we invest through this, um, it I'm doing something with the money, and at one point I'll give— even if it's a minimal— again, my minimalistic, uh, even if it's a minimum return, that's fine. As long as it's safe, that's okay. That was my mindset. So when I— so the consultant, um, when, when the financial consultant and I discussed, we discussed about, um, investment ISA account. ISA investments.

Yes. So is that the one we discussed? You mentioned in the academy, I think it says with profits ISA. Yes, investment.

Yeah, yeah. So the Profitizer investment, so where again, uh, supposedly a wealth manager was supposed— will be taking care of all the funds and, uh, he would be moving the funds wherever the interest, uh, wherever we get better returns and stuff like that. And so I started, I said, okay, we, um, at that point I was, uh, thinking, okay, I'd be able to, you know, um, invest if this is the only investment that I'm going to do. I thought I'd invest about £500 per month. And but I was too— I was aware that there will be some, you know, the charge, the fees they charge from the amount that I— that is deducted. Like if they debit £500, the fee will be initially charged and the rest of the amount will be invested. So that I was aware. And then by the end of one year, I saw there was not very greater growth, I would say. Okay, when I actually did the math, so I had roughly, um, uh, £5,000 had, um, gone off my account by then. Okay, and then, uh, the fee, uh, the total bonus that I got at the end of one year was about £288 only.

£288 on the £5,000, you got about 280. That's roughly like maybe 5% or roughly.

Yeah, and then the charges that they deducted, that's totally, uh, that was, that came to about £180. So the total, the amount was only £108 in as a bonus.

Hang on, sorry, I want to get— I'm really sorry that I'm smiling. Well, you're smiling, I can't help but smile. And it's nothing stupid because a lot of times doctors were very brilliant in our jobs. We are kind people and we are trusting people. And so we trust— like, if, if I met you as an emergency physician and you handed me a patient as a physician in the hospital, okay, yeah, I'll trust you, guy. So the financial sector is a little bit different. Like, there are lots of people posing as, oh, financial advisors, and they are, but many are also restricted in that they can only offer you the products that they have. In their company. They can't offer you any products outside. And also some of their, um, remuneration, some of their pay is tied to sales. So if they bring in more money, they make more commissions and all that kind of stuff.

I was actually thinking, if my mindset was, okay, I'm fine with people having, uh, commission or charging fees and everything, so if their, um, commission or their remuneration depends on the profit that I make, that I thought then I they would make it, uh, their, uh, life's mission to get the greatest profit so that they will get a greater remuneration. But, uh, but that— I think that is the mindset back in my country. So that's what they would do.

You've just hit on something really important here, but carry on, I'll— we'll come back to it. So you thought— you thought that their performance, which is basically a totally different game— like, one of the people that inspires me a lot is Warren Buffett. So when he had his Buffett partnership, or I don't know if you know Mohnish Pabrai, he's from India. We've met in Omaha, we're both shareholders in Berkshire Hathaway. He's a great investor. He wrote the book Dando Investor, like he manages in billions. So Mohnish Pabrai and Warren Buffett, their partnership that they run, or when Warren Buffett ran it, is that they don't make profit before you make profit. So there is a goal like, okay, they are going to hit above 6%. If they go above 6%, which I was considered as well, if I just bought like treasury bills, I could make up to 5 to 6, 4 to 6%. So anything above that, then they get like a percentage of that. So that's their performance fees. In this case, um, their incentives are aligned with yours. So like you said, this is a big issue, right? Okay, it's a big issue. Financial industry, I have a bone, you know. The incentives are now aligned with you because they will make it their life mission to make sure you do well. But that wasn't the case in this, in this particular case. Like, you put in your 5,000, we take our fee, and then we invest the money, and whatever performance happens, we're fine.

It's your headache. Yeah, because of— because they take the fee beforehand, the positive feedback loop doesn't happen. So, but then again, uh, like I said, I was told, or maybe I understood it wrongly, because the wealth manager's main mission is actually to get you proper benefit, proper profit, because, uh, that would decide his remuneration. So either the wealth manager doesn't care about the profit, or, uh, I understood it wrongly.

I don't know. I— it's just somehow, if you get like medical notes and you're reading it, you understand everything. If you get financial notes and you're a little bit new to the system, and this person is speaking a very nice Queen's English accent and wearing a nice suit, and you think, well, they're like— and they've been recommended by a big medical association, I think, yeah, they have my best interests at heart, and they're kind of like professionals. But the financial industry, the bias is illegal. The medical industry, the bias is ethical. Will I do this to my mom? Would I do this to my brother? So that's it. So, and returns in itself, as you know now because you're an educated investor now, you've been through the Investing Academy and the whole mastermind you know now that some years returns might not be great.

Yeah.

So in a year where the returns, like, you put in $5K, there's a fee goes out, then the returns are like $288, which is like roughly like 5% or whatever. So after they deducted the fees, which are 62% of your returns, after the fees are deducted, so it's as if your returns are kind of like maybe around 3%. That, that would be a fantastic result if the average market returns in that year was -2%.

Yes, I agree.

But did you, did you, did you look? Did you check what the average— like, if you had just bought like a broad, well-diversified index fund, did you look?

It's been anywhere, uh, my, my, uh, understanding is that anywhere between 13 to 20% would have been, uh, somewhere that, that's where I would have clicked.

Yeah, I think that was right if I remember correctly. I don't know the figures off my head now. I think the previous year the S&P 500 had done about 25%, um, the FTSE World a little bit less. But again, the question is not how well do they do, is like how well relative to the markets. They're like, what, what, what is the extra? Because if I want to pay for performance, okay, yeah, but are you going to do better than the market long term? Yeah.

Frustration. The whole point was, when you— when there is nobody— it is not something like we are actually deposit, um, um, you know, investing in a fund or anything, or investment— investing in something at the beginning and just close our eyes and, you know, take, um, move away, or, you know, do some other job. There's a wealth manager taking care of that particular fund whose whole job is to keep moving the funds as and when the market goes up and down, depending, and to have the awareness of what's happening around and see where to invest and where to withdraw the fund from. So if that's not happened, yes, ultimately I end up only being 6%, which is, uh, um, and then after the fees it's only 2%, that's not 2.16%, that's not a great return is what I felt.

But again, that is sort of like, it's just the fact, isn't it? Because I looked it up now, S&P 500 2024 did about 5%, and 2025 did about 17.9%. And FTSE All-World, which is a bit more broader, uh, goes beyond the US and covers more countries across the world, was in like 14% in 2025 and 18.93%. Of course, it's not a recommendation for anyone to go out and buy these funds. As you know, everyone's risk tolerance and risk capacity and capacity to bear loss and their goals are also different. For you now, you, you're a young consultant, fairly about the same age, I can say. Young consultant, even though you look younger than myself, or you're a young consultant and you've got like maybe another 15, 20 years you intend to work depending on your goals. For someone who is a consultant or a GP who is planning to finish in the next 5 years, how you invest may not be how they invest. Basically. So, so how come— was that a discouragement for you, getting this kind of like really poor returns from what was supposed to be like a professional, even though it was restricted firm? Um, for someone who's listening, the difference between restricted advisor and, um, independent advisor— do you know the differences between the bank institutional versus the restricted, which means there's a bit more availability, and then the independent advisor? Could you just quickly summarize it if you are just explaining it to someone who doesn't really understand?

So the bank can give you the different products, but they can't actually— they can just say the differences, like this is this and this is that, and they can define things for you. The advisor can give you more, uh, of what are the— I mean, their own products. The panel, they will be able to say only about their products. They won't be able to compare it with the what what's there in the market or compare, I think. But they'll be able to say a fair amount of things, or almost every, um, like I think 99% of the points in their product they'll be able to say. But the independent advisor, whereas they'll be able to give you all the options, I guess. This is, uh, I have understood probably.

I'm—

I mean, you can correct me if I'm wrong.

I think you're right, you're right on the money. The bank is basically like you go to a pizza shop, oh, you're gonna get a pizza. Hey, we do pizza here. Why are you talking to us about salad? We do pizza here. If you want a pizza ISA, you get a pizza ISA. If you want a pizza like pension, you get a pizza pension. So that's the bank, and that's what you get. Um, do you think there might be better pizza next door that is cheaper? We can't tell you anything about that. That's the bank, that's the institution, that's the insurance company. That's basically— if that's what they do, so the insurance company cannot compare the whole market for you. So the registered advisor has a little bit more options. They might have a panel of 20 products. I don't know the numbers they have, but they are not whole of market, so they are quite incentivized because all this is about incentives. That's why in the UK, when you are seeing a patient and you're prescribing for them in emergency medicine, you're not getting a kickback from the pharmacy company, so it doesn't influence what you prescribe. I, I mean, doctors, we take the oath, Physician's Oath, so I don't think that we are likely to go to prescribe differently if the case was different. But again, there's that chance if there was a system where we get paid depending on what we prescribe. It's just structural, right? You can have a fantastic advisor, nice person, good person, and wants to do right by Renuka. But the system is that, look, you can't— if you advise Renuka that this mortgage or this insurance or this investment product is not good, it's not as good as what you can get elsewhere, you don't— it doesn't, it doesn't work out really good for you financially. After a while, you might be asked to leave, you know. I don't know. Yeah, so that's the structural system. But interesting thing, so you had this experience which is not great, and thank you for sharing that with us because you've been very gracious to share that, and you're smiling all through. But it's basically like, yeah, it's basically like 5,000, you could have gotten like maybe a better return, but now you didn't get that great return, but you had your whole money, didn't lose your capital, which is, which is yay, right? Um, but how come you still carried on investing? Was that— wasn't that discouraging enough for you to say, you know what, I'm just gonna put my money in the bank or do something else? So what was— what kept you going?

So again, bank's option of— I, I initially, to be honest, I initially searched for any provision to fixed deposit or any, you know, just do the deposit and forget about it. The bank will give interest. But the interest, like I said, the interest rates were very low, and so that option was not there for me. Um, I, I didn't want to go with that option actually. And then next comes, um, and then I had a brown envelope from HMRC saying, oh, brown envelope. Actually, I was in training at that time. They— I mean, it used to come often saying your tax code has changed or something like that., and I never took any, um, um, note of it. I was like, okay, tax code has changed, you don't have to do anything. Uh, they would have written like, you don't have to do anything if you think it's right or something like that. And then I'll check my payslip and the tax code would be the same, and then I wouldn't do anything about it. Okay, fine, everything is fine. So it's all systematic over here in the UK, so what more should I do about it? I'll just— I'm happy with, uh, as long as I'm getting the salary that fine. Uh, but then when I got the, uh, a brown envelope saying that I owe about £905, that's where, like, why on earth do I owe HMRC £905? Was— that was not, not £905, sorry, £926. Uh, and that too, I was only in training, um, at that time. So I was like, my salary is never going to, um, you know, reach £100,000. Why would I get so much? And anyway, my tax is getting deducted, um, at the source itself. So how can there be a discrepancy was my, uh, question, because I've never faced this kind of situation back home. So it was new to me, and that's when I looked into it, and that's when I was, um, you know, browsing all topics and YouTube and your videos on, uh, you know, different, uh, like basically, um, the tax relief stuff, the allowances, tax-free allowances, and then tax relief with the help of SIP and, um, you know, private pensions. All those things started coming up. So once you see one video, it'll—

the algorithm will keep giving you just another one.

Yeah, so, um, that's when I understood that, you know, I was even— uh, it was news to me that I was able to claim back, I can claim back things like, you know, your BMA or ARCM fee and GMC registration and the GMC annual fee and stuff like that. Uh, till then I had no, um, I mean, till then nobody mentioned it to me actually.

Really? Yeah. So this is very interesting, obviously, for me. So you found, you found me online. Is that like you found Moneywise Doctor videos and stuff online?

I was on Instagram that I came across the first video, and that video gave the link to YouTube, and then that's when it started.

Wow, okay. So this— which year did this happen?

Uh, 20— around the same year, I, I think, and, uh, towards the end of the financial year 2025.

Good. So 2025, you found this thing, you found this crazy guy online saying you can claim tax relief for professional expenses. You don't have to fall into the 60% tax trap. You can take some money and put into your pension. And what made you think this guy should trust what he's saying? What gave you that impression?

No, basically, um, I asked some of my friends. So I asked like, um, I mean, I heard, I heard that we are able to claim, uh, the tax back on the fees that we have paid. They said, oh yeah, yeah, you can pay.. And I said, what is self-assessment? That's why. And they said, you know, the tax returns that you claim, that you basically, um, you know, you file every year. So in my country, I used to file it every year.

Yes.

Yeah. So, um, oh, so that's tax returns. We call it as tax returns.

We don't— the same thing, self-assessment, tax returns.

Yeah. Okay, so that's tax self-assessment. So I said, okay, I'll do it. The It's not a problem. But then, then there was this, uh, a lazy block because I'm a lazy person, I would say.

Uh, emergency medicine consultant claims to be lazy. I understand you.

I understand why you say, because anything that needs to be done in a new way, you need fresh brain and fresh mind to start because then you'll be able to get more, uh, information and get more work done. I don't want to do it on a, when with a tired mind, that That's the whole point. So I was actually procrastinating. Okay, I'll do later, I'll do later. But then someone, um, I think one of your videos only told me that I can claim back up to 4 years back. Yes, yes, in 2025 at that time. So my— I only started in 2020, but that financial year which ended on April 2021, those are only 6 months, and actually I didn't lose much tax in that, or in— so I just left it. So it was only from 2021 that I can if at all I have to. Okay. And that time I still had time. So when that video, and at that moment I had time still, I can go back and I can claim for all the years that I have done. So I was like, okay, I have time, no problem. So let's do it later. I kept procrastinating and I didn't do it until, uh, until— so I left, I lost one year in that, and I, I was able to do it only, uh, from the tax year 2021-22. 2022, um, um, from in April, in the tax year that ended in April 2026.

This is interesting, right? Okay, I love it, I love it. It seems like he found the video at the right time. And look, for anyone watching this podcast, obviously you found it, go ahead, share it to someone else. Renika's friend didn't, probably, I don't think they were malicious or anything, they just didn't know that he didn't know, because you don't know what you don't know.

I think the culture here is nobody talks about tax or money or anything. Yeah, but he's very professional. They have their break, uh, they might even talk during the break. Probably they might share like what you do during your vacation or your different thing. Nobody talks about anything financial or anything, um, anything of those sort. I mean, people are very private over here, and that's okay. That's that's, that's the culture over here. That's, that's cool.

Do you think it works against doctors sometimes? Because I've had a doctor who said she was being paid 60% of her salary. She never knew until one day her colleague— she's a consultant pediatrician, obviously in the community with us— um, her colleague complained that his pay was less this time around, and the colleague was underpaid. And when, oh, what, what were you paid? And they started talking, told her the colleague that was underpaid, even the underpaid amount was more than what she was being paid as a consultant pediatrician for over 2 years. So it was only when she now wrote and they found out that she was being paid less than— so they had to go back. And so because people don't want to talk about money because it feels a bit dirty and all that, um, but in your case, you talked to your friends and found out they were claiming tax relief. But it was also a good time because You can go back 4 years, right? I— and, and do you know how much you might have money to claim? Because you can claim up to £2,500 per tax year. But do you know how much you managed?

And so then what happened was I made a call to HMRC to say that, hey, I want to do a self-assessment and I want to claim— they asked me, why you want to do self-assessment? And then I said, amount that I can claim back, and that's why I want to do the self-assessment. And say, okay, um, so one of One of the officials was so kind, he said, okay, do you want to do it over the phone or do you want to do it online? He said— I said, um, if it's on the phone and if it's going to be quicker, then I'd prefer the phone. So he went through the things and there was— there's some questions that's being asked, like, do you have anything like a, like a private job? Do you have this? Do you have that? You have to, um, uh, you know, you have to fulfill one of the conditions for them to actually Self-assessment. So I was again stupid and I said, uh, is, is your claiming amount more than 2,500? I said, no, no, it's going to be less than 2,500. And then you don't, uh, don't— then you don't need a self-assessment form, go do the P87 form. The challenge was, uh, through the HMRC, um, so I again created an account to— got the gateway thing and stuff because nobody tells you all these things. You do self-assessment as if it's something like go buy a coffee in Starbucks. Yeah, well, you have to find, uh, create an account and then create an HMRC account, then, then do a self-assessment account, and then you need, um, so many, uh, numbers and, you know, login and everything. So for you to have everything one by one, it takes weeks in between.

Yes, it didn't— I kind of like did a whole guide on that, so it has been used by thousands of doctors.

So you're the guy, but the guy doesn't, um, the practical issue is when you are like today, I am, I'm free, I can, I, it's even if I'm free for 24 hours doesn't mean that I can sit within this 24 hours, I can finish the whole guide, though I can take the concepts of the guide I have to depend on when HMRC will reply to me or when I'll get the information for me to proceed to the next step. So it's not like, uh, every day, or, uh, I know it's not like one of your assignments from your hospital or from your projects where you can finish, okay, one day I'm going to finish everything from start to finish. You can't. You are dependent on people responding to your requests.

This is really good. You've touched on something 2 or 3 times now. I think we should address that. It's information overload. Content is everywhere. You say you're lazy, I don't agree with that. I'm lazy as well in something. I believe that things that don't— that drain your energy, that's where you're lazy. Things that give you energy, that's what you do. Um, so, but this is something you've been touching on, it's come back again and again. Content is everywhere, but context is not plentiful. Yeah, there's a lot of information, but there's no accountability. And part of You've obviously been through our Tax Hack X-ray sessions in the Mastermind, which is like you join the session, you figure out your taxes in the 2-hour workshop, you get it done with other people, accountability, you get it done, you push it through. Um, you've been through the 4-week deep dive, the Investment Academy, which is all part of the Mastermind, my financial coaching that you join, which is 4 Saturdays. You join other people, start from the scratch, at the end of lesson 1, lesson 2, lesson 3, lesson 4, you become an investor. Um, so you've touched on something a lot of times. There's a lot of information, but there's not a lot of support. There's a lot of information, there's not a lot of accountability. Someone saying, hey, what's up, where are you with this stuff? Has it been done? Do you need any help? There's a lot of content, like lots of people on YouTube say just buy index funds, but then you jump in there now you see 870 options. There's not a lot of context.

The points that you have to see before choosing an index fund is something that you need, like the, the TER, or what is the, um, uh, you know, the percentage that's being deducted.

The percentage, the TER. You're right.

What is the platform fee? Is there a platform fee at all? Yeah, so many aspects.

And, um, accumulating versus distributing. What is your personal investment playbook?

I remember when you said, okay, uh, we should all— one of the first things that, uh, because I pre-booked your book and I actually was reading those things also. Yes. And, um, one of the first things that you said was everybody should have an emergency fund, which, like I mentioned in the early, um, part of the, um, podcast, it's cultural that we all have some emergency fund all the time because otherwise, uh, we don't don't like to ask somebody for help during emergencies.

That is beg, borrow, or steal.

Yeah, that is actually, uh, it's one of the worst, uh, things basically, uh, having to do that, or if you are in that situation. And, um, all our efforts are towards always towards to avoid that situation. So one of the things that you mentioned is everybody should have at least 6 months worth your salary.

3 to 6 months.

Yeah.. And if it is in cash ISA, that would be like, you know, that would play the role of both, you know, for tax-free allowance, and also it will get some interest. And you know, it's a safe place to keep the money. So even for that simple thing of starting a cash ISA, I had to do a lot of research to find the proper platform with the proper interest, which is actually good enough, which is, you know, compare so many things and easy The ease of doing things should be there and then do it. That also takes time. It's not— it does— nothing comes so easy. Nobody gives it like, okay, do step 1, step 2, step 3. It's not like a recipe.

Yes, yes. I love that. I love that. So 3 to 6 months worth of your living expenses in emergency fund. So that's the point you've said again and again. For someone listening here is there's a lot of information, but being able to do it, and that's the whole point of what we do in the Mastermind, our financial a coaching program. 99% of doctors who use our content is totally for free. Get it on YouTube, come, uh, go free masterclasses. A few people, okay, buy the book. Actually, this book, you know, thanks to people like you, it became a bestseller on Amazon, a bestseller in UK on investing, on personal finance and money management and retirement planning. So that just because we have like over 600, almost 600 doctors pre-ordered it, and doctors were ordering it for their colleagues. So by the time the book came online, within a few days it became a bestseller. Um, but one of the things I realized, even when some people are finished reading the books or going to get like some 90%, might say, oh, I read the book, it was fine. But then there will be people that, oh, I followed their YouTube and I watched a lot of it and it's fine. But there's 1%, especially senior doctors, who think, well, I've fallen into this 60% tax trap now. Like, you were a registrar, you were just earning some money, not a lot, and suddenly you're a consultant, let me enjoy now, and you fall into the 60% tax trap. So being able to open a personal pension or deciding whether to pay more into your NHS pension or how much to put in there and how that can help you. And then you talked about setting up HMRC account and even starting to invest, which index X fund or ETF are you buying? Not just buy S&P. Some people say just buy S&P 500. They've not talked about is it globally diversified? Okay, is it accumulating? Is it distributive? What are my goals? What's my horizon? So you've said something really powerful here. There's a lot of information, but it's not the same as that handholding, just like we do in the Mastermind. It's not the same as that accountability or having that small community where you come and say, well, I'm trying to save this to my account, I don't seem to get what I'm saying, or I'm trying to have this done and I'm not having any luck with HMRC. So what's been your own experience so far?

Yeah, I just wanted to say, uh, before I go into the, uh, the other part, like, yes, so in medicine we always say, um, if you— or in life in general, we are always advised, if you want to be successful, you actually fix one person as your role model, and whatever that person that has done to where he has gone, where he has reached. If you follow each and every step, you will also become successful. But that doesn't happen here in the— yes, I have seen you, you've been successful in your investment, but I can follow your steps of investing. You could say, yeah, I mentioned this, I invested in that, but step to that investment has multiple mini steps.

Yes.

And those mini steps for you are for you to discover, and it again depends on your current financial situation, family situation, and so many aspects. So those things, it really needs a lot of time and self-investment, introspection. You just understand what's going on and then take decisions. Like, then you also understand what sort of political views you have. Why you— yeah, are you more kind of, uh, you know, a very, uh, low risk taker? Or is it basically, do you want to be more like a socialist? You want to, you know, and stuff like that. So everything come, uh, you know, uh, has a together in it.

Yeah, that's interesting. So there's one, one exercise we did in, um, the Investing Academy called Building Your Own Investing Playbook. Um, you seem to have been touching on some of those things. You said your risk tolerance is low. That doesn't make you a bad investor. Actually, some of the best investors I know in the world, they have low risk tolerance. But you know yourself, you look into yourself, which is— because some people think if you come to Investment Academy, we'll tell you what stocks to buy. No, that's not what we do. Even though I've been an investor for 21 years, but we kind of like— you learn who you are as an investor, you learn your risk tolerance, you did the whole test quiz.

It's changing, is it? Initially, when you are, uh, when you have zero knowledge, everybody starts with a very low risk tolerance. And then what happens is then they start thinking, okay, I still want to be low risk, but I, I, with my current, with, uh, with my current health and current, uh, life situation, current salary and everything, if this has to continue, I can probably, uh, take a little bit more risk. So that will actually, that actually pushes many people from low to moderate, not high, but still low to the lower, uh, end of the moderate risk. So then when they see returns, then, I mean, again, it takes time to learn. Like, you, you you sort of get the habit of watching the market, get the habit of watching the news, get the habit of, you know, trying to tie up things like why this happens, why this happens, just correlate stuff, and then you'd be able to project and predict and stuff like that. So anticipation and you're able to predict stuff, it doesn't come overnight.

Yes. So basically, even though we don't follow an approach of market timing, but understanding what is happening helps. Uh, I mean, our approach is basically you don't need to be checking your investment account daily except you've got like— it's part of your investment playbook. Because for some people, the investment playbook is they've got a percentage of their investment that is for having fun in the market, and the bulk of their investment is in broad, well-diversified, low-cost ETFs. So that's all really quite important. Now, if you were to look back at Renault Car, like when it got from how many years ago? What, how many years ago did you become a doctor?

Oh, doctor, as a doctor, uh, to just give off my age and everything, but that's not your age, but you can tell us, it's all right.

Um, if I guess, should I guess, right? Did you become a doctor in 2010?

Just a little, uh, one year before that, 20— 2009.

2009, good. So you became a doctor in 2009. Been a doctor for 17 years, so that's quite impressive, isn't it? That's 17 years career. If you were to go back to Dr. Renuka from 2009, you wanted to pass on some financial advice because now you are, you're not just, um, you're an investor, um, you've sort of like started being more careful with your taxes, like you've done some clever things in terms of avoiding the 60% tax trap which you found yourself in before coming to the Tax Academy. Did you want to share about that?

Yeah, I wanted to tell you about this. So when I did the P87 form, you know, the £926, um, brown envelope that I owed HMRC, that got automatically cancelled because they owed me like over the years, they owed me like so many, so many, so many, that got cancelled. So that, I was happy with that, okay? I was like on the top of the, um, like cloud nine or something, almost £1,000.

Was wiped off.

Yes. So that was gone. But then when I became a consultant in 2025, that's when— so there's a lot of— there's a salary jump, isn't it? So it is more than $100,000. You go above $100,000. And now I go into— like, I am actually literally walking into the 60% tax trap. So literally, like, I'm welcoming HMRC, hey, I'm coming for my money. As tax. So, uh, so when I did that, again, I got an envelope, uh, after this— that, that, uh, financial year ended, saying that I owe about, uh, 6,000. So that's a lot of money, isn't it? So yeah, um, so a lot of money. I was like, why? How? I mean, what did I do? I didn't do any wrong. All I've done is just go work, um, you know, do locums and try to— and that too, the locums were not, uh, for, um, like I did not approach for, ask for locums because I need money. It's because there was like departmental pressure, strikes and this and that, and we, we had to do for the safety of the department. And we have been asked and we were paid, which was fine. Okay, so, so what happened was when I got that ₹6,000, that's when I started like, what is the mistake that I'm doing. And then again, I went in, went, went back to your book, and that's when I was listening to all the other of your YouTube videos. And that's when I know, okay, the SIP is an important aspect of— for tax relief. NHS Fleet, or anything before the tax is applied, that could help with the tax relief. Anything makes the net income to be to less than 100,000 is what we have to do. And if only somebody had mentioned this, or only we had talked about this among, you know, friends or colleagues or people who have been doing this, it could have been of great help. And nobody— like I said, everybody's strictly professional, very professional, which is great for the patients and for the healthcare industry. It's just that I was not aware of the goodness of SIP. So for me, when somebody says pension, all I think about is that's after retirement.

That's like far away. You're not thinking of tax efficiency now.

Like, I was like, yeah, let me see if I'm alive till then. That's, that's my attitude. That was my attitude actually. Let's see what happens at that point of time. Um, that's when I got the brown envelope, and it was like, um, an alarm in my head. And then, then when I— when I— after discussing, I, I even had a discussion with you. I had discussion, I, I actually read more, um, again, the chapters in your book, and I, I got more information, um, from the websites, from YouTube videos and everything. Then I said, okay, SIP is the next step that I have. And then now the SIP problem is again same issues with the any investment. You have to choose the platform because each platform has some plus and some minus. And then are you doing, uh, on funds, or are you doing on stocks, or are you doing on individual, uh, companies or shares or anything? So all those things. So because I, um, get— because when you are doing the Investment Academy class Classes, you basically advise for, um, like a common advice to all which everybody in the audience can apply to. But as an individual, each person, like I have a special interest towards, or I like some company, or I like— exactly, when I would like to, you know, invest in that. It's not like I'm expecting, uh, I don't expect to become a millionaire, but it's just that something that I like and I want to support.

Yeah, actually that's That's where your personal investing playbook comes in. Actually, that makes absolute sense. We've had some doctors pass through the Investment Academy, and they're not going to invest in any company that does any sort of weapons, or, you know, they might invest in— they will not invest in carbon, sort of like people that are not carbon neutral or net negative. And also, there are doctors who will not invest in funds that are not, um, Sharia. Who are not halal funds. So everyone has got to do investing in their own way, but you first have to understand the basics, understand who you are as an investor, and then you make your own playbook. I say to people, you've got to have your investing playbook before the market crashes. You have to have an investment playbook before someone comes here and say, this is— this good is too good to be true. And in your playbook, I say, did I say I was going to invest in whiskey? No, whiskey is not there. And when the market crashes, what did I say I'll do when the market crashes, I said I'll keep buying. Okay, I'll keep buying. So if you haven't written it down, people tend to react knee-jerk reaction, right? So that is actually a very, very good point. Now you said something, you've said it twice again because I'm picking on, on some themes you're giving here. I think they are really useful. You said in medicine people tend to stay professional, they don't tend to share stuff, and that means sometimes as a whole profession we tend to lose out, right? Someone watching this video as a doctor. I'm just wondering if they might share it in a WhatsApp group to other doctors. I had this doctor, lovely doctor, she was in the community, she's in the community, she's a consultant now. She was born in the UK, grew up in the UK, 15 years as a doctor in the NHS before we talked. That was the first time she heard about claiming tax relief. I mean, she's heard it, but she didn't— just like you, she thought, how is this going to make any difference? So she, in your case, you were able to go back 4 years. In her case, she was able to go back 4 years to the current year, but she's lost about 10. So that could be anywhere between £10,000 to £25,000 tax relief. And she said to me, why didn't anyone say this to me? I said, I don't know. I only started my blog in 2023, February. But you know, you might not have heard about it then. And then, do you know what her husband did? Her husband's job? He was a big accountant from one of the big firms. He said, I'm going to ask my husband about it. I'm like, I'm not a marriage counselor. I don't know anything about this. Maybe husband was busy with millions, you know, this is terrible. Yeah, so these things happen, and a lot of time people hear stuff, they're not necessarily maliciously gatekeeping, but there's that lethargy and inertia, like, do I really want to share this with Renuka? I think Renuka already knows. Definitely.

Um, ask my friends, uh, my colleague consultant, with, uh, when I mentioned to him saying that, you know, I have a brown envelope asking for £6,000, what do I do? I was like, am I going to— did I do any mistake? What did I do? Or something like that. He was like, no, no, all of us have had that kind of, uh, yeah, there's a salary jump. You have to, uh, it's better that, um, you get, uh, you speak to a CA or auditor, uh, you know, a consultant, like a tax consultant, so that they'll be able to help you step by step. And then I just wanted to— well, I would, I would, um, get their help to do my self-assessment, uh, get an auditor or, um, a CA, or a, like, a chartered accountant to do the self-assessment form. But before that, I made— I wanted to make sure that I know what is happening.

You understood what was happening, right?

Meaningful conversation. Because one of the disadvantages post-COVID is most of it is online. Hmm. So I don't know where this person is going to be from, and all, uh, and, uh, they might be somewhere else in the country. It's not— they might not be from the same area where I could actually meet face to face and say, see, these are the things and this is what I want, and, um, these are my, um, you know, these are the aspects that I want wanted to, you know, sort out, or even doubts clarification and stuff like that. Not very easy, uh, post-COVID, to be honest. So like, I mean, it is easy in, in the sense that you can actually get in touch with anybody around the world, but human, like, and that person need not be— like I said, it could be with, uh, the same thing that happened with the investment company, you know, can happen with anybody else also. They might— for, for them, I'm just a customer, just a number, just a client. Okay, for me, it is my money. So it is basically, they, they need not, uh, sweat to save each and every, um, last dime of mine. I mean, they'd say, ah, this is all I can do, and they can just walk off. But for me, it is different, isn't it? So I wanted to get a grasp, get proper baseline and then seek help.

This is all what Moneywise Doctor is about, being able to take charge of your future. This is why you're saying to me, Renuka, you're kind of like dropping a lot of gems here. So you are not saying that you wouldn't consult an expert if you need to, but you're saying you want to understand what is happening you want to have a little bit of control. You don't want to just, oh, I'm just going to delegate my money to you, and then in a year or two or 5 years or 10 years' time, you tell me, I'm really sorry, we did our best. Especially when I'm not in the room with you to say, what do you mean you did your best? You know, in the emergency room, you are seeing the person, you're not doing a remote consultation. So that's, that's what I think. I feel like more doctors should take a little bit more interest because one option would be I'm going to bury my head in the sand, I'm going to pretend, um, the HMRC will take care of my taxes and the government to take care of my pension.

Honestly, that is what I thought because the system is very robust, isn't it? It's so well organized, it's all digital, it's all— you get everything, um, in the— from the websites and everything. I thought everything is, you know, being, um, like taken care of. Done real time, like every day everything is getting adjusted and calculated and everything. Unfortunately, it's not that way. No, it's not.

It's not, Reneka. You've learned, you've learned, but you learned faster than most people because a lot of people find out— I've had doctors pass through the mastermind who are in their 60s, and, um, doctors and their sisters said to me, I wish I met you when I was in my 50s because then you could have had 10 years to, you know, change the course of directions. Um, doctors in their 50s said to me, I wish I met you in my 40s. Do you know what doctors in their 40s said to me?

They should have met you when they were doing the training.

I wish I knew this in my 30s and all that. I always say you start where you start. Now we've had a lot of discussions. I suspect we could go on and on because you have a lot of interest and we've not even gone into the— go, okay, carry on.

One thing I wanted to say was, again, for the SIP part, the pension summary, and yeah, that was again a big obstacle. Having a SIP account, it seems very— it sounds very easy, but in reality it is actually very difficult because for you to get the summary and then to, you know, work out the allowance that's remaining, that so that you don't go over, all those aspects, it takes time again. So like, I was watching this, you know, I did the mistake of waiting till the last minute, so please don't do it.

Oh, okay, this is really a good one. So basically, when you hear, oh, just open a SIP account, many people think, I can just go up and open it there, I don't need anyone to help me, or I don't need to ask any questions. But that could lead to a more costly mistake because there's another annual allowance of £60,000. You've got your NHS pension growth, and you've got like, um, an allowance. So if you exceed that allowance you could get a penalty. Of course, there's carry forward because you're a registrar previously, right? So you have unused allowances that could actually be used. And you told me something earlier on about you had some money, you put it in your ISA, but now you think maybe you should have put it in your SIP. Maybe you could have reduced adjusted net income. So let's give some advice because you said in medicine a lot of people don't share. It's not financial advice for anyone listening. We don't know your situation, we don't know your risk tolerance, risk capacity. But let's say the same way I think you have learned quite a few things. If you had a doctor, a consultant, or even SAS doctor, registered GP listening, and if maybe not a doctor, someone who has fallen into the 60% tax trap, if they have found themselves, and basically if you could explain the 60% tax trap to them and then what you would do in that situation. Based on your own experience, could you do that in a minute?

Yeah, so what happens with the, um, for higher income group, so when the income more than £100,000, so what happens is for every, uh, £2 earned, £1 will actually be taken as your asset tax. And so what, uh, in order to compensate, HMRC will just bring down— I mean, uh, what will happen is you're already paying 40% tax. Yes, 200,000 or the— I don't remember the limit. It's like 40%.

Yeah, above 50,271, you're very close.

Yeah, so you're already paying the 40% tax and now you're above 100,000. What happens is that your tax-free, um, allowance, 12,571. Yeah, actually decreasing one by one, uh, little by little by little. Then that's when you get the brown envelope saying your tax code has changed. So whenever your tax code has changed, it means that your free allowance has decreased, which means you're already getting into the trap little by little. You're creeping into it. Uh, the tax code keeps changing, uh, with that, isn't it? So they keep changing the tax code to make sure that you're still having a little bit of allowance, and then, but then you're paying like 45%, and then 50, and then at one point when it's more than £100,000, you're gone, like 60%.

So basically everyone has a personal allowance, which is— so, so summarizing what Renika said, everyone has a personal allowance that is tax-free and it's £12,570, right? And as a higher-rate taxpayer, if you're earning above £50,271, you're already paying 40% tax, okay? But you have this £12,570 that is tax rate. So by the time you hit £100K in adjusted net income, now for every £2— and most doctors get there, right? If you're a doctor, you become a consultant or a GP or a SAS, if you're working a full-time equivalent, you're going to hit that £100K. And for most, they're living in medicine for so long, and yeah, it's quite a well-deserved salary, maybe even better. But you get that £100K and the government says, hang on, you're doing too well now. For every £2 above £100K, you lose £1 from that 12.570. And by the time you hit £125,140, now you've lost the entire 12.570 and your effective tax rate is 60%. So for a doctor consultant listening to this now, even, even a nurse or pharmacist who find themselves in that situation, what would you say for them to do? Of course, we know it's not regulated financial advice, Let's just say, what did you do in your situation?

So first and foremost, um, we have to see how much we can claim back with taxes.

Yes.

So again, self-assessment will be there. Um, you can claim back all the professional fees, your exam fee, and then your, um, you know, the— if you're working from home, or your, um, your usual things for work like your equipment payments and stuff like that. You— there's a set amount for all those things, or any conferences that you have paid which you have not been reimbursed from your trust, or like allowances, all, um, exam fees.

Yes, CCT.

Yes. Yeah, so all those things you— we can get the relief. So that, uh, so whenever HMRC says— so say for example, in my case it was £6,000, but then HMRC again owes me from all those tax years that are the tax relief that I have claimed, it owes me like say £2,000 or £3,000. So the £6,000, they will adjust it to £4,000 now. So now what I can do is the next step would be for me to— that, that I can claim via self-assessment. So self-assessment, if it is more than £2,500. If it's less than £2,500, you have to do the P87 form. Yes. So our next step would be for to open a SIP account.

Okay.

SIP account, I need to have the pension summary. Summary statement, which he tells me, uh, for every financial year of the $60,000, uh, pension allowance that the government has given, how much is remaining, how much, how much of your pay, how much pension input amount or pension growth you've already used.

So I can work out from the $60K how much headroom you've got.

Yeah, on that much amount, I can, uh, up to— I can go back up to 4 years, I think, 4 years 3 years.

Yeah, so the current tax year and 3 years back, so yes, 4 years in total.

Yeah, the— in, uh, up to that, this I can invest in my SIP. So I can do it as a lump sum or I can do it as a monthly thing. But for me, I should, uh, I think if you don't have the pension statement summary also, you should not stop you from starting a SIP account. You can maybe start with very low amount, like say £100 per month, and then you get the proper statement, you can actually calculate the difference and you can invest. Say if you're investing £4,000 or £5,000 in, in the SIP account, uh, the platform itself will get the 25% tax from HMRC. Yeah, that's the money already tax has been collected, but then you're putting back in pension, and pension money, uh, pension is before tax.

Yeah, so you get like some sort of like— it's 20% gross, 25% net. So that means that when you put in 20K, you got like 5K back. I think, I think that, that sounds like a really good summary because that—

the rest—

oh, there's another step.

And the rest of the 20% you can actually claim back with the self-assessment.

Self-assessment, that's good. So in a nutshell, if you find yourself in 60% tax trap, you can claim tax relief for your professional expenses to reduce your adjusted net income. Obviously you can give to charity, you can contribute to your pension, and when you contribute to your pension, make sure you are not exceeding the allowance and the allowance. Don't just think about this here, think about the previous taxes. That's a fantastic summary. Um, and in your case, you mentioned you can start a SIP even if you've not gotten your full PSS, right? You don't know the exact amount because in your case you could risk that because you were a resident doctor, you were like, um, a registrar the previous year. But even someone has been a consultant for many years, yeah, yeah, yeah.

50 pounds a month.

Yeah, or maybe wait and get it to know. Okay, this is really, really good. Before I let you go, there are just two things. I want you to give some advice to Renuka from 2009, one. Then two, I want you to share your experience so far because you've been through— you've been participating and you've been really a very valuable member of the community. Not just because you're in the mastermind, but you ask questions, you bring in things, you add your own contributions. So I'd like you to share your experience in the mastermind. So my financial coaching, which is usually just for a small cohort, 30 doctors, senior doctors, we open it a few times a year. And you've been through the mastermind, which included investing academy, had the Power Hour Plus, which is financial strategy sessions, you had the tax hack, I don't know if you use my AI as well, our private AI, or you didn't get to use it yet.

Not yet.

You didn't need to. You could just ask in the community. And then you've also had them sort of access to the vault and the rest of all that.

I've accessed the vault videos because obviously, because of— because I work in A&E, uh, um, some of the weekends I will be at work and I will miss the class.

And then, uh, so I go back and All right, so basically you didn't have to attend all the sessions live because you could go back and watch them at your pace. So what has been your experience of the mastermind? Do you think was it a good idea or just a waste of time? Be honest.

I think, uh, it actually gave me a lot of insight into where I was leaking money, like how you in your book, um, where I'm, um, first foremost thing that you mentioned, which, uh, which basically I was like, yeah, you know, I know this, how come I didn't know this? So this was the thing that you said was just look into your bank statement, your credit card statement, see what are the subscriptions that are getting deducted even without you being aware of it. For— I have been aware, I've been very aware of this, uh, since the beginning. That's why I don't subscribe to anything like Netflix or Amazon or anything. I don't subscribe to it at all. And I need for a month, and even when I subscribe, I cancel it immediately so that it just gets deducted for that one month and then it doesn't do anything. So I've been, uh, cautious on that regard. And when you mentioned it also, like, you know, cancel whatever you're not using, not giving you the proper, you know, returns of what—

yeah, it's not giving any satisfaction, or, you know, that's the—

that's like, that's the preventive measure. Isn't it? The first thing is to plug your leak where you're unnecessarily wasting money. Second is where you're excessively wasting, where you could get a cheaper thing. Like, you know, you're going for brands and stuff when you'd have an equivalent, and— or you don't need it, no, no need of the brand, but you can, you can do the same job with other things. You'd be fine with it, um, unless it's something like, for example, um, like an iPhone. I love my iPhone and it, it Yeah, a job, a good job for about like 5 years or 6 years. I've been having the same phone and it's not caused me any problem at all.

Remind me of our iPhone discussion when we're in the— when we're discussing about the moats, company moats, and how to look at the quality of a business. I know you said no, I'm not giving up my iPhone, right? Sorry to interrupt you, carry on.

So wherever— so first thing is, uh, those that are not necessary, take them off. Take the leaks that are not necessary. Those are excessive leaks, like you need them but you can actually get a— like even your, your investment platforms, the platforms are necessary but you can see how much charges they actually, um, you're paying for them, and then you can titrate or you can basically filter them according to your situation. And then So, you know, do some research because a few minutes extra spent on those things can save you hundreds of pounds.

Yep. My case saved me thousands. Which for some doctors, if you don't make up to £1,000 per hour, then if you spend half an hour and find a better deal, like my broadband, I shared with you guys how I got like a deal that was 3 times better just because I spoke to them. I said my contract is finishing. What are we going to do about it? Have you got a better deal? So that was a really good one. So that was one of the things you got out of the mastermind, being able to be more intentional about your finances, plugging the leaks first before rushing off to think of what to invest in.

I love the approach that you mentioned because obviously, because in A&E we follow the ABCD, first stabilize the patient and then we see, then we start treating, uh, things. So I, I have a new— actually, when I was I was reading the book, I was just giggling, laughing. My friends were around. In fact, over the weekend also, I was actually laughing and they asked me what's happening. So, you know, so I was actually mentioning—

I think one of the chapters, the one you referred to previously, was Chapter 5, was Clamp the Tax Bleed. That was Chapter 5, is all about taxes. Clamp the Tax Bleed.

Okay, I was like, yeah, we have to stabilize the patient before you treat the baby. Once you stabilize, then there is a point in actually starting other treatments and stuff like that, you know. So that's what— so you clamp those things initially, then you start treating that. The second thing that I liked about was the SIP part, and the third thing was then you actually see one growth. So this is just to get the baseline proper and steady, and so that you can build on it with investment into ISA, stocks and shares, shares, um, and rather than general investment account, because then you have capital gains. And then the— in the ISA stocks and shares, how do you choose the, uh, you know, the— if it is a fund, okay, then what are the things to look into and what is the DR percentage? But then if it is individual, uh, you know, shares or individual stocks that you want, and then there was the third week was for those things, right, to look into you know, all the aspects of what you need to look in.

Yeah, the books, the income statement, balance sheet, the story, the numbers, and how to do a discounted cash flow analysis. I think, I think at some point you said, well, this is not for everyone.

I don't think it's not for everyone. I think everybody should, should be aware of it. You know, say for example, like, say, uh, let me put it blankly. As a doctor, any doctor for that matter, will— when you say appendicitis, will they know what it is?

Yes, they will.

And you say, I need the surgery for appendicitis, will they be able to appreciate?

Yes, they will understand it.

Yes, they will be able to appreciate. Yes, it is something that's needed, right?

Yes, they don't have to be the ones to do it, but they know.

They don't need to know whether it's laparoscopic or open or anything. They need to know there need to be an appendectomy done.

That is— that's a really good point. Yeah, that's a really good point.

These are the basic things that any doctor should be, um, aware of, or should be, should be able to— at least they don't need to be expert in all the numbers and everything. They just have to know what to look, where to look, and what it means.

I agree. I mean, one of the things, one of the doctors who joined us who owns his own practice in Canada, if you remember we've got a few doctors joining our Investment Academy for Canada, and he said it helps him in his business being able to understand his income statement, his balance sheet, his cash flow statement. Because again, our approach to investing is that we're not gambling, we're not buying things and hoping they go up. We're buying businesses. Yes, we are investing in businesses, and the business is an engine of growth. People are going there, they're working daily, and want to participate at as part owners of that business so that when they increase their cash flow, our business is getting value whether we sell it or not, whether the price go up or not. Because in the long run, the stock market is— in the short run, the stock market is a voting machine. I think this came from Ben Graham, Warren Buffett's mentor. In the short run, in the short term, the stock market is a voting machine. In the long run, is a weighing machine. So the prices might go up and down because we are excited SpaceX and all that kind of— but in the long run, the market settles down, especially during market crashes, which is usually my favorite time. I'm not really a bad person, but that's when I'm able to buy quality companies for cheap, like during COVID But in the short— in the long run, then the market really weighs, why are we paying so much valuation for this company? What is their free cash flow? What are they making? What's the return on invested capital? And at that point, some companies are weighed and they are found wanting. And that's what happens, that's how bubbles— and you know, when sort of like people just sell off when there's a lot of hype and then things crash, then those companies don't really recover. Some of them might take forever to recover.

This is in— when I look back in my country, when like I said, when the banks actually, you know, gave suggestions and let's have much much say. Like, though, if it's mutual funds, it's okay. If it's like, um, it's like, um, the bank itself will have multiple funds put together into a small, um, like a pot, baskets, or a basket. Or I should call that as a, we have a new scheme, or we have this new thing that we are introducing, like a fund, like the bank's fund or something like that. We don't have much say because, uh, where the funds are going, or according to the market, up and down. But when you are doing it individually in, uh, the ETFs and everything, you can say, okay, I'm not interested in this anymore, I would like to, you know, focus on this, uh, fund more, and I can actually keep moving it. So that financial freedom is something that you will start enjoying. For a starter, I think that was a good thing, that I had to, you know, just trust what the bank people were saying, but that's okay. But at least now I don't want to do the same thing. And also, um, One interesting thing that I wanted— that just I remembered was when I was, uh, seeing, uh, one of the Instagram Reels, when your Reel also came up. Before that, there was one person who was saying, if you are wasting time, like 30 minutes on Netflix, at least try to make use of that by investing £30 in Netflix stocks. Okay, at least do that so that whatever my— the time you wasted, they'll get some profit with the stock Actually, I felt, oh yeah, that is what— that's very important, making so many people rich around us.

Yeah, that's one, that's one way to look at investing. That's obviously everyone has to come up with their own personal investing approach and personal investing playbook.

I think Apple we're using, uh, some people drive BMW, some people drive Tesla, some people, uh, have— you're using so many So many commodities and all these commodities, not just when you are buying and you, we are actually making them rich. I think they should also make us rich. You know, it's, there must be, I mean, yes, you're using the product so they can actually do more when their shares and everything do well, we can actually get some money out of that as well. So I think these are the aspects of, you know, you start thinking along these lines when you start investing.

What I'm getting from you is that going through the Investment Academy made you to become a better investor because you now start thinking like an investor. If you were like looking at stuff, you're thinking, who is making these things? Are they making any money? Like during COVID some people just didn't connect the dots. Like Zoom was becoming popular, the stock was blowing up, and even those pharmaceuticals, they now won huge contracts to make like, um, the jobs. And these are sort of like, if you guys read one of the books recommended in the academy was Peter Lynch. Um, I forgot the name of that bit. Peter Lynch, he wrote the book about One Up Wall Street or something like that. And that was his approach, like just day-to-day life, how an average person who is not even an investing professional can notice things and say, why is everyone going to this particular place? So I think I appreciate that. You dropped so many interesting— it's been so, so much fun talking to you, and I feel like we could go another like 90 minutes and not finish unpacking it. But for someone who's been watching so far and you wanted to summarize or you wanted to give like 3 pieces of advice again, back to Renuka in 2009, brand new doctor, because you've been on this journey, you've gone from— you didn't understand what you were doing, now you kind of like understand tax efficiency, investing. I feel— I know from the point when you started the mastermind and now you're so much more in control, you have much more confidence, and you're calm about money. What about someone who's just starting out? I mean, either they're brand new in this country, or they've been in this country, they were born here, or they're new dogs doctor, what would you advise? Like, let's say 3 pieces of— like, if you don't remember anything else we said, take these 3 things and run with it. What would you say?

Start as early as possible, but whenever you start, understand the fact that there is no free meal. So if every income, there is a tax. So you, uh, starting early will help, will give you— will make you be ahead of the race. Number 2, um, as much as investing and growth is important, same way, uh, preventing wastage of money is also important. And, uh, so the third one would be, um, yes, life has expenses, but some of the part of it can be reimbursed or can be, uh, saved or can be paid paid back, or you can get a payback. So make sure that those leaks are also sealed. So it's always, um, you— it's, it's, it's normal doctor way of doing is primary prevention, secondary prevention, and tertiary prevention. So primary is, uh, you actually prevent unnecessary wastage. A term, okay, the prevention is you plug the leaks, and tertiary prevention is basically stabilize with your pension and your investments.

Who could have put that better? That's from the point of an emergency medicine physician. Like, don't fill up my emergency room. Start with the primary prevention. Eat the vegetables, go for the walk, and make sure you stop smoking so they don't have a heart attack. But if you're gonna have a heart attack now, oh God, now you're coming to my emergency room. Then there's secondary and tertiary prevention after you've had a heart attack. Are you taking your dual antiplatelets? I like that we're taking medicine and fusing it with finance. I love that so much. This is so good.

What I liked about your book as well, so there's so many aspects where you've correlated the doctor's point of view, doctor's way of— their way of explain, uh, explanation that you've given, provided in the book. Actually, uh, it's in the same language that we talk on, or, or our mind Indians think on a daily basis. So it's very easy for me to, you know, I can finish the book. I could finish the book very quickly because of that.

Yeah.

Compared to a normal finance consultant writing a book, you know, all— it's like a financial consultant about appendectomy and all the, uh, the various layers of abdomen that has to be gone through. Like, he'll be like, I don't need this.

Yeah, I, I think is good. I'm quite surprised with the feedback we've gotten from non-doctors, non-medics. We've had like lawyers, IT, and I remember going to a climbing gym and someone said, I read your book, it was really good. But you said it's for doctors, but it was useful for me. Why don't you just call it Moneywise? I feel like the last hour and a half, there's been a lot of interesting discussions. But these last 3 points you dropped, that makes it a real Moneywise is Dr. I think, I think this last 3 points, anyone who listens to it, Dr. Rinca says start early. Compounding takes time. I started investing at 19, so that allowed me time to make mistakes, recover, learn things, experience 3 market crashes. And by the time I was in my, um, later 30s, like around 37, I was able to walk away from my salary job and I need the job. So start early. Um, number 2 is yes, go ahead and invest, but understand that there are risk There's always risk, and do what you can to mitigate that risk. And number 3, before you jump out to invest, plug your leaks. The leaks could be tax leaks or expenses leaks, but just make sure you plug your leaks. This has been such a fantastic session, Dr. Renuka, and thank you so much. Do you have any sort of like final thing you want to say in case someone wants to look you up or invite you to come on their podcast? Where can they find you? I know you're very like, oh, I'm not into podcast, but you can see a great podcast material.

I don't think that I could contribute to all the podcasters who are, you know, they're overflowing with knowledge and everything.

What you're contributing is not content or information, it's context. Remember that, remember that. You're bringing your own context because everything I've written in this book was not new knowledge. There was already like personal finance finance books. But part of why surprisingly it resonated is that I'm— is me. When you're reading it, you're reading me. You've been to my workshop, so you know how I sound. So when you're reading it, you're reading me, and that's also a different dimension. But I'm so happy and I'm so delighted to have had you here, and thank you so much, Dr. Renika. All right, you've been listening so far, you've been like a fly on the wall. The best you can do tell Dr. Renuka one thing that she shared that you found useful and tell me one thing I've said that you disagree with. Or if you've learned something, just tell us in the comments. We're delighted that you've joined us so far. Have a lovely day. Bye-bye.

Bye.