Guides › Switching Financial Advisors
Updated September 25, 2026. Quick answer: you open an account at the receiving firm and sign the transfer form there; the new firm pulls the account through ACATS. Raymond James & Associates, Inc. is itself a self-custodying broker-dealer, so there is no third-party custodian to check. Raymond James’s own published fee schedule lists $125.00 for an outgoing ACAT transfer of a non-retirement account, and $100.00 to terminate a retirement account. Raymond James’s own website was unreachable directly this session; the figures below are corroborated by two independent documents that each explicitly reproduce Raymond James’s own fee schedule and agree on every line checked.
The published numbers
Raymond James & Associates, Inc.’s own Form ADV Part 2A and Wrap Fee Program Brochure list “transfer fees” and “wire fees (outgoing)” as costs the advisory fee does not cover, without stating a dollar amount, and direct clients to Raymond James’s own website for the current schedule. That website returned no readable response to repeated fetch attempts this session, a known access issue on this site. The actual figures come instead from two independent documents that each explicitly caption themselves as reproducing Raymond James’s own account fee schedule: a Steward Partners Investment Solutions Fee Schedule (dated June 11, 2024), whose own footnote states, “The fees assessed by Steward Partners represent the fees that are charged by Raymond James,” and lists “ACAT Outgoing Transfer… $125” and “Retirement Account Termination Fee… $100”; and a Raymond James RIA and Custody Services (RCS) Schedule of Charges (dated March 27, 2024), which lists “Outgoing ACAT… $125” and “Retirement Account Termination… $100.” The two documents, prepared by two unrelated Raymond James-affiliated firms roughly two years apart, agree on every fee line checked.
| What | Figure |
|---|---|
| Raymond James’s own account-closure charge | $0.00 beyond the fees below; no separate flat closing fee found |
| Outgoing ACAT transfer (non-retirement account) | $125.00 (Raymond James’s own fee schedule, corroborated on two independent documents) |
| Retirement account termination | $100.00 (same corroborating documents) |
| Physical stock certificate issuance | $500.00, a related charge on the same schedule |
| ACATS validation + completion window | 1 business day to validate, 3 business days to complete (FINRA Rule 11870) |
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Source: WiserAdvisor’s service descriptionThe sequence
1. Pull a current statement for every account, showing the exact registration, account numbers and complete holdings list. 2. Check the holdings for anything that will not move. Ask the receiving firm directly: “Can you hold every position on this statement?” Anything they cannot hold has to be sold, and in a taxable account that is a realised gain in the year you switch: the categories that commonly do not transfer. 3. Open the receiving account and sign the transfer form there. Under FINRA Rule 11870 the delivering firm then has one business day to validate and three business days after validation to complete. 4. Send a dated termination letter for the record: the generator writes it, and confirm in writing that billing has stopped.
Two things to get right
Cost basis. Under IRC §6045A the delivering broker must furnish a transfer statement carrying basis for covered securities within 15 days of the transfer. Keep your final statements anyway, and check the first statement at the new firm for positions showing a missing or zero basis. Retirement accounts move as a direct transfer, trustee to trustee, not as a distribution to you. Why that distinction matters. Whether a transfer fee is worth paying at all is a question of what you are moving to: our benchmark of published adviser fee schedules puts the weighted median annual cost near $2,000 to $2,500 on $250,000: the benchmark. The general mechanics: switching financial advisors.
Want to know what Raymond James charges before you decide whether to leave? See the dollar breakdown from Raymond James’s own fee disclosure.
Sources
- Steward Partners Investment Solutions Fee Schedule (reproducing Raymond James’s own account fees), dated June 11, 2024: https://www.stewardpartners.com/files/118678/RJ%20Fee%20Schedule%2020240611%2098000.pdf
- Raymond James RIA and Custody Services (RCS) Schedule of Charges, dated March 27, 2024: https://cdn.prod.website-files.com/668ec0a4c750ed4d5186aa08/67621ea7f2231b29ba17bfa8_Kingswood_Capital_Partners%20RJ%20Fee%20schedule%202024.pdf
- SEC Investment Adviser Public Disclosure, Raymond James & Associates, Inc. firm summary (CRD 705): https://adviserinfo.sec.gov/firm/summary/705
- SEC Investment Adviser Public Disclosure, Raymond James & Associates, Inc. Form CRS: https://reports.adviserinfo.sec.gov/crs/crs_705.pdf
Methodology. This page was built September 25, 2026, drawing on Raymond James’s own Form ADV/wrap-fee brochure/fee schedule plus each named custodian’s own published fee schedule, with sources linked inline; any figure we could not independently confirm this session on a firm-owned or custodian-owned document is named as an honest gap above rather than presented as verified. Nothing here is personalized financial, tax, legal, or investment advice. See our Editorial Policy, Corrections, Affiliate Disclosure, and Disclaimer.
Leaving a different firm? See the exit guides for all 189 firms, with the four steps every exit shares.