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Imagine it’s Monday night. You settling on the couch ready to engage with Rebel Finance School, full of good intentions.
You have a notebook. You have a cup of tea or an adult beverage of your choice. You have that little spark of hope that this might finally be the thing that helps you sort your finances out!
And by the end of the session, part of you is buzzing because you can see what is possible.
But another part of you is thinking, “Brilliant… now how do I actually do it?”
That is the question we have been pondering.
Because Rebel Finance School (RFS) is not here to give you a nice ten-week tour of how to take control of your finances and then wave politely as you wander off into the night still not quite sure what to click, open, track or change.
We want this course to help you actually do the thing. The whole purpose of RFS is to help you track your spending, pay off your lingering debt, make your first investment, optimise your existing pensions and so much more.
That is why we have been looking hard at the feedback, thinking about what you asked for, and shaping our plans for Rebel Finance School (RFS) 2026.
Rebel Finance School 2025 Feedback
The feedback from Rebel Finance School 2025 was genuinely brilliant and so useful. You can read the full article about the feedback from RFS 2025 here.
You told us the course helped you feel more confident, more in control and more hopeful. You loved the warmth, the humour, the plain English, the practical tools and the feeling that finance had stopped being this scary, intimidating thing and started feeling doable.
That is wonderful to hear and it also tells us something important.
We do not need to rip the course up and start again. The heart of it is working. The 10 week course creates massive impact for anyone that does it.
But alongside all that lovely feedback, there was also a very clear message about what would make the course even better.
You wanted more practical help.
- More worked examples.
- More help doing the thing, practical implementation.
- More support with the questions that come up once you sit down and try to apply it to your real life.
At the same time, you also wanted the main sessions to feel tighter, clearer and less overloaded.
In other words, the message was, “Help us act on what we have learnt more easily.”
That is the challenge we have been trying to solve. How do we keep the heart, the warmth and the substance of Rebel Finance School, while making it easier to follow, easier to implement and easier to get help when you need it?
Our plans so far for Rebel Finance School 2026
We have spent a long time brainstorming, reading your feedback and coming up with ideas. Here is where our thinking has got to so far…
1. Monday becomes the clear core teaching session
We want Monday to be tighter, clearer and more focused.
That means each Monday session would be built around one main idea, one main lesson and one main action.
Not thinner. Not watered down. Just more focused.
The goal is that by the end of each Monday, you know what matters, why it matters and what to do next.
We think that will make the teaching easier to absorb and easier to act on.
There is a real balance between giving you just what you need to act on and really telling the story of why it is important, showing examples and giving you everything.
We have spent a long time debating what you need to actually be able to take control of your finances and we are going to work this year to make Mondays far tighter and clearer.
Our aim is to drop the run time from 90 to 120 minutes to below 90 minutes a session.
2. Thursday becomes a practical implementation session
This is probably the biggest change.
Rather than Thursday being a open Q&A, the plan is for Thursday to become a practical session linked to that week’s topic.
So instead of staying theoretical, we would use that time to help you actually do the thing. To implement what you have learnt on the Monday. For example:
- After the spending session, Thursday could help you set up your spending tracker.
- After the net worth session, Thursday could help you fill in the net worth tracker and do your first ever net worth statement.
- After the investing session, Thursday could help you compare options and take the next step.
- After the platform and tax session, Thursday could explain tax on SIPPs and then GIAs.
- After the retirement session, Thursday could help you use the calculator and test your own numbers.
That feels much closer to what you have asked us for. Not just more information. More help implementing it.
3. What happens to Q&A?
If Thursday becomes more practical, the obvious question is this:
What happens to the Q&A?
The answer is that we still want you to get your questions answered. We just think the support may need to happen in a smarter way.
Our current thinking is that more questions could be handled through the Rebel Finance School Facebook group and the AI bot built into the site, rather than relying on one weekly live session to catch absolutely everything.
That means you could get help more quickly, more flexibly and in a way that fits where you actually get stuck.
We also want to teach you how to use AI during the course, so it becomes a useful support tool rather than just another bit of confusing internet noise.
One idea we are especially excited about is helping you create your own kind of virtual Donegan. This means setting up AI in a way that helps you ask better questions, think things through, stay on track and keep moving forward.
Because we do not just want to answer your questions for ten weeks.
We want to help you build confidence and capability that lasts beyond the course. The idea is to make ourselves redundant. You have got all the information you need, you know what to do and how to keep it optimised for yourself.
If we can do this, then we can just hang out and chat about fabulous breakfasts, Lego and adventures in retirement!
If you want to check out and use the AI bot then it is the yellow bubble at the bottom of the Rebel Finance School Course Library Page!
4. More short support videos around the course
Another big idea is to build more short explainer content around Rebel Finance School 2026.
This will be a YouTube explainer series that sits alongside the course and helps with specific topics people often get stuck on.
Short, focused, practical videos.
Things like:
- How to think about a specific investing decision
- How to understand a key concept without needing to sit through a giant live session, which also makes it more shareable
- Current issues and how they affect our investing strategy
- Specific tool guides and run throughs
So instead of trying to cram every explanation into the main sessions, we can create more help around the edges if you want or need it.
We have already started filming this series and our plans are to launch the first video on May 7th this year.
More support when you need it. Less overwhelm when you do not.
5. A clearer rhythm all the way through the course.
- Monday teaches the key idea.
- Thursday helps you implement it.
- The support content around the course helps you keep moving.
- “I tracked my spending.”
- “I know my net worth.”
- “I opened the account.”
- “I understand what I own.”
- “I know my number.”
- “I actually changed something.”
How does it feel to you? Please leave us comments. We want to know what you think of the proposed changes.
What stays the same?
A lot. Because a lot is already working and already helping you.
In the quest to constantly improve we have to hold onto the core that made the program so powerful for so many of you.
Rebel Finance School 2026 is still planned to be
- free, with a money back guarantee
- practical, even more so this year
- plain English
- supportive
- encouraging
- non-judgmental
- fun, learning personal finances can, and should, be an enjoyable experience
- focused on real life, not finance waffle
- built around helping ordinary people take control of their money
We are still teaching the full journey from spending and debt through to investing and retirement.
We are still trying to make money feel less scary and more doable.
We are still giving away the tools and lessons that helped us change our own lives.
And we are still not interested in turning this into some cold, corporate, joyless finance machine.
It is still Rebel Finance School. We just want to develop it so it works even better for you.
Why we are sharing this before it is final
- You know where you got stuck.
- You know what helped.
- You know what felt confusing.
- You know what would have made it easier to take action.
- If something sounds exciting, please tell us.
- If something worries you, please tell us.
- If you think something is missing, please tell us.
And if you think something could be better, please tell us how you would improve it.
Help us shape Rebel Finance School 2026
So over to you. Pop your thoughts in the blog comments below.
We will read them, collect the themes and use them to help shape the final plan. Because if we are doing this properly, we should not just build the course for the community. We should build it with the community.
Katie and I want to make sure Rebel Finance School 2026 is the very best version yet and gives you everything you need to take control of your finances.
Love, peace and pineapples
The Donegans
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More ideas/implementation of de-accumulation stage when you start retirement including drawdown from pension etc
Hey Caroline, We are planning on splitting the decumulation session we did last year out into a mini-series later in the year. this is a huge subject. Did you see the workshop we did this year on the subject? https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gUZFJbkCsuk Was there anything specifically you needed more of?
Sounds fabulous. Putting a kid to bed too will likely happen with short sessions.
Perhaps creating a pinned post after each week in Facebook for questions relating to that content could go? Alot night miss it but could centralise alot of info to revert back to.
Martina, I LOVE that idea. I hadn’t thought of that and then we could group discussion about the week and keep it tighter for everyone. This is a FABULOUS idea. Thank you. Alan
It was difficult to dedicate one evening per week to learning. I fear two evenings a week may be too much for some?
I loved and greatly appreciated the course last year. I often missed the Q&A session due to other commitments.
Many thanks guys
Keep up the great work.
Hey Jon, Thanks for telling us and we know the course is a lot. I appreciate that. That was one of the main reasons we put it on YouTube too so people could watch at their own pace. Personal finances is not a small subject and we try to give people everything they need. Thank you for your feedback. Alan
I’ve only found RFS in Jan this year at the age of 53 and think what you’ve achieved is absolutely amazing. The course is fantastic and I’ve learned so much. Thank you so much. Words don’t sound enough though. Im truly grateful. My 23 year old son is onboard and wll be FIRE in his early 40s thank you to you.
I’m looking forward to the new 2026 course. Loving the updates, they all sound good.
Two things from me. It’s helpful to have an empty A4 notebook with lots of pages. I didn’t realise how many notes I’d take but will do this to keep it all in one place to refer back to for this year’s course.
Secondly, I watched it back on you tube on my phone. One little thing I’d like to see corrected if at all possible is sometimes the subtitles which you can’t turn off cover important information t the bottom of the slide. (Not a complaint, just an observation).
Julie, LOVE that you got your son on board. CONGRAULTAIONTs. That is amazing and what a great age to start!
Love the idea of the note book and taking notes. We had a LOT to share during the course… That is so annoying about the subtitles covering content. I will have a think about that because I think Zoom adds them and then YouTube adds more as well. I will see what I can do to get rid of them and make it clearer. I am REALLY glad you told me otherwise I would not have known! Sending much happiness. Alan
How do I sign up for the new course in 2026. Can you give me a link please?
Of Course Jyoti, here is the link: https://rebeldonegans.com/finance/rfs/ Sending happiness. Alan
Sounds like a good plan 👌🏼
Thanks Anusha! YAY!
Hi Donegan’s
Really love your ideas and plans.
Really looking forward to RFS 2026, I attended solo last year (not live) but hope to rope the wife in too this year.
My only reflection really is that I found the Thursday sessions super helpful as people would tend to ask questions either I would have or would have been too dare I say embarrassed to ask. I found it made you guys more personable and approachable and now I love reaching out and hearing about your travels on FB. You’re real people with real lived experience of what you are teaching which is amazing I just wouldn’t want you to lose this as the course grows.
Either way I am so excited to attend this year and so is everyone I meet and tell about your amazing course!
RFS 2026 here we come!
Michael , what a LOVELY message. Thank you. I really appreciate it. I wonder if we can still do a few Q&As anyway and a few chatting sessions. Umm. I love that you wrote this and asked for it. We 100% want to keep the personal connection and chatting to you and the other people. That is what lights us up!
Let me consider it.
Love that your wife is coming. How did you persuade her to do the course with you? Say hi from us! Alan
I am now retired (65) but I am not at state pension age and wish I had known about your course 10 or 15 years ago. I would be interested in more tips on investing in later life . I have my work pension and some emergency savings but I understand that investing is for life albeit with probably a shorter time frame!
Thank you both for all your hard work.
Catherine
Hey Catherine, Thanks for commenting. Let me have a think about what we can provide for with that. The investing weeks cover the investing and the sequence of return risks cover that stuff. I guess we need a guide with more specifics? What specifically do you want us to cover? I am so glad you wrote and told us! Also have you tested asking the new AI bot on the mission control page? https://rebeldonegans.com/finance/rfs/course-notes/
I did the course last year – it was fantastic and I began investing, thanks to inheritance. If there could be section devoted to GIAs and CGT that would be utterly brilliant. There must be people like me who have never had any significant money, so are flummoxed when they get it left to them. Had I not found this group, I would still have it stuck in HS banks and would still b pontificating about consulting an IFA (noooooo!). Even a section on IHT would be marvellous, but I guess that’s pushing my luck 😘
Jane we will do the GIA stuff this year I promise. katie and I are planning a walk through video and back up spreadsheets to work it all out! that we will do. The Inheritance tax will probably be later. We have a lot of other things to provide first! Thank you for commenting! YOU ARE AWESOME> Alan
Looking forward to the new course – I think the new structure will be very useful, look forward to starting!
hanks Jo! that means a lot! YAY. Alan
Regarding the Q and A now being in the Facebook group instead of in the Thursday session, is it possible to set up a dedicated Facebook group for 2026 course participants? The existing Facebook group is great but it’s very large, and I worry that questions specifically about the course will get lost in all of the other posts.
Thank you again for all you do!
Hey Eliza, that is interesting. The Q&As will be with the AI bot, we have some more plans on that and we will answer lots on the Thursday session through the practical stuff. on a specific group for the 2026 cohort I will have a think about it. My worry is that will remove all the people that have done the course before that can help answer those questions and doing this will mean you won’t get the help you really need…..
Thanks Alan! Your reply is much appreciated. I’m very much looking forward to the new course, and I’m sure it will be brilliant 🙂
YAY! see you there on June 1st!
Tax pls and applying for sipp rebate as a higher tax payer and free vs paid for options
Hey Dominic, Got it on tax. We are planning more this year. Plus did you see the letter for reclaiming the higher tax rate in the notes for that week? Alan
I really like the idea that Monday will be the ‘theory’ and Thursday will be the ‘practical’ or application of what has been learnt. This in itself will help reinforce the concepts that have been introduced at the start of the week.
There might be a need to look at the membership of the Facebook group – there seems to be an increase in the number of posts these days from users who are joining ‘cold’ without reference to the course but seeking financial advice on the basis that the group title has the words ‘finance’ and ‘school’ in its title.
Hey Martin, glad you like the new structure. I am hoping it makes it easier for everyone to follow. And you are right about the facbeook group. I think Katie and I need to give more leaderhsip there and maybe do more videos and posting to help people understand what it is about! Thank you for pointing out. This is on my list to do ! you are awesome Martin. Alan
Hi, I did the course last year and found it really helpful. I’m planning to do it again this year because I want to make sure I really understood it all. One thing I don’t feel fully confident about is the actual mechanics of the week 8 investment. What do you click where to get your investment made and up and running (seen quite a few people say they think they clicked on the wrong thing or the notification they got back from Vanguard does not say what they expected). I know that is a Vanguard lack of clarity issue really but I think it would be really helpful in giving confidence to newbie investors like me. Also, does it make a difference if you access Vanguard funds not through Vanguard, but through II or T212 – I see variants of this question come up all the time on Facebook so I think I’m not the only one. Thank you for all your hard work Alan and Katie! PS I like the new format idea :)
Kate, thank you for this and YES, you’re not alone! The mechanics of actually clicking the buttons and getting invested are the bit that freaks out most people, even after they “get” the theory.
Here’s what helps:
Vanguard’s confirmations are often vague and confusing. If you set up a regular investment, it might look like nothing’s happened at first — that’s normal.
To check you’re actually invested, look at your “Holdings” and “Transactions” tabs. If you see your chosen fund listed and the money has left your bank, you’re good!
If you use ii or T212 to buy Vanguard funds, you’re still buying the same thing, just on a different platform. The main difference is fees, features, and how easy it is to manage drawdown later.
We’re updating Week 8 this year to show exactly what to expect on screen, what a normal confirmation looks like, and how to sanity-check your investment. Plus we have the new Thursday sessions where we actually want to go through and do all this with where to click and more.
Did you see our step by step guide to Vanguard Videos? https://www.youtube.com/playlist?list=PLRjwfVU_qq2b9ZZRBaATQvfCx9uy1dmdQ
Peace and pineapples,
Alan & Katie
Sign me up for 2026 please. Thank you Lisa
Hey Lisa here is the link to sign up: https://rebeldonegans.com/finance/rfs/ Can’t wait to do the course with you. Alan
I really enjoyed the 2025 course (on catch-up) and am looking forward to this year’s live. Personally I’m fairly AI-averse and would much rather you keep some ‘human’ Q&A, but I do understand it’s really hard to fit everything in! Thanks & see you soon!
Hey Helen, we can absolutely keep some Human Q&A and will do that throughout as well. the AI bot gives us the ability to scale our support a bit but we hear you. Thanks for commenting. Alan
This is probably something that only applies to a small subset of participants so I get that it may not form part of the core course.
I am lucky enough to have filled my ISA and SIPP (non earner so only £2,880 = tax relief going into the SIPP), so have a fairly sizeable GIA. Now I’m fairly comfortable with CGT and Dividend Tax, but I am having a mental block regarding ERI. I have read numerous articles on the subject and sort of get the principle, but just can’t quite grab the specifics. It is something that crops up in the Facebook Group from time to time but I haven’t yet found an explanation of how to deal with it in practice that I can fully understand.
Hey John, thanks for the nice comment. We haven’t covered that before. Just to check do you mean Excess Reportable Income. In relation to GIAs (General Investment Accounts), it represents taxable income that an offshore fund (like an ETF) has earned but has not distributed to you, which you must report and pay tax on annually?
Is there a reason you have off shore funds not funds that are onshore? Could you give me an example of a fund so I could understand more?
Thanks for commenting. Sending happiness
Alan
Great idea to have the smaller bite-size explainer videos. It’ll really help finding key points rather than going back through the full sessions trying to find them.
I have a query around owning shares in an index fund if that’s okay? If you literally own shares in many companies, how does it work in terms of shareholder voting, dividends, AGM invites etc? Do you get daily bombardment the way you would if you held an individual stock? And if you get lots of dividends, do you need to track them for tax purposes?
Looking forward to attending the live sessions. I watched back on YouTube in January, and this time the enemy will be watching with me 😀.
Hey Bob, the enemy? This year’s course is going to be so much fun.
Answer to your questions. Voting rights are generally handled by the index fund so you don’t see any of that at all and don’t get any notifications . We don’t get nay of that through our vanguard funds or platforms. I am not sure about getting involved if you want to but this is the most passive and least work I have ever had with an investing.
if dividends are in a ISA, LISA or SIPP you don’t need to track anything at all and the accumulation funds reinvest it all for you. if it is in a GIA then you would need to track dividends and declare tax etc. We are going to do a full session on that this year as lots of people have asked.
Does that help? Sending you happiness. Alan
Thanks Alan, yes that helps a lot, and happiness received.
One follow-up question if I may. We often talk about the ups and downs of the markets, but not so much on the dividend income. Would that not be as, or more, important than the market fluctuations? Do you (or rather Katie) do spreadsheets / graphs for that?
The enemy …. thats the long-suffering Missus 😜
Hey Bob! send the enemy some love and happiness too! lol.
On the dividends the charts we use are normally for the accumulation funds so the returns include dividends but aren’t explicit. We could do it with a income unit that pays out and shows the dividends over the years but then you don’t see the compounding in the same way and we don’t know what people would or wouldn’t be taking out. So it was easier to use accumulation units.
the dividends still come in the market downs you are right. The swings are normally so big that you don’t see it but if you had income unit you would get the dividends out even though the value of the units has gone down.
Alan
Hi guys
The new course structure sounds like a great idea especially for someone who learns best through doing.
It might be a niche ask but I found myself in a confusing situation when my husband died with regard to finances.
There were lots of things I didn’t know (death payment from the govt, inherited ISA allowance, pension beneficiaries to name a few) and I wondered if you could touch on these things and how to sensibly navigate these areas especially when you’re not thinking straight. Kind of like “what to do financially when your spouse dies”.
Thankfully he had a will but I still have a lot of overwhelm in relation to what to do with the money I’ve received and how to provide for our son (under 18).
It’s the main reason I’ve signed up for the course as I’ve always been a saver rather than an investor, and I’ve only got a work place NHS pension at the moment.
Looking forward to learning and benefiting from something positive
Hey Tammie, thanks for the message. Awesome you have signed up to the course and that is going to cover most of what you need to organise the finances, get invested, provide for your son and more. The strategies apply the same. I am sorry to hear about your spouse and I know we can do more on this subject specifically.
maybe you could tell me what wholes we have after doing the course and we could create a video specifically for that? Thanks for writing. Alan
I have only recently found RFS having seen an article recommending you guys on the internet. I have watched whatever I could find on YouTube although the complete 2025 course didn’t seem available. Just signed up for 2026 although I think that I will mainly be watching on catch up. I am 60 next month, I have savings and investments but have no idea about my numerous (small) DC pensions and SIPP – so that’s my main point of interest.
Oh, and thank you both for the information I did get from YouTube. Following your advice I switched all of my ISAs and SIPP out of vanguard LS funds and into their developed world (ex-UK) fund – every little helps!
I don’t do Facebook but my wife does so I will be pestering her to post questions!
Hey Alan, thanks for commenting and welcome to the gang. The new course starts June 1st and is on YouTube so you can watch whenever you like! Good spot on the Small DC pensions, it is 100% worth rounding all those up and getting them working for you. Do you have a list of old employers you can track down where they all are? Are you retired yet or heading that way? Thanks for messaging and super excited to hear what you think of the course as we go through it all… Alan
Hi Alan. I know where all of my work pensions are and I’m currently receiving one (approximately £100 a month) and I am reinvesting that back into my Vanguard SIPP.
I’m not yet retired and I think that I will be working until I am 67 as I don’t think that I will have enough funds to retire before I receive my state pension. I’m hoping to get all of my investments to work as hard as they can from now so that we can have as comfortable a retirement as possible. I will also be paying extra attention to the lessons on making the most of the withdrawals!
Hey Alan, that makes perfect sense. love you know where they all are. You are further ahead than most and getting them working for you is the most important thing. The stock market doubles every 6-7 years so you should have a good sum ready for that retirement! Nice work. Alan
Hi you 2, did the course last year and it was fabulous, so inspiring and useful so am watching again this year. This year I will retire and I really do think you guys helped give me the extra confidence in my asset allocation to do this! I am constantly amazed by the effort you put in. I think this year’s content is a great improvement and I like the Monday/Thursday approach. I am very excited about the upcoming ‘how to live off your investments’ session. Wish you had an Australian ‘special’ but the rules here are complicated and you can’t cater to everyone! Love to you both, hoping that you have a wonderful holiday to recover from the full-on experience that presenting this series must be.