FAIR Canada applauds Saskatchewan’s OBSI bill
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News and resources for Canada's top financial advisors
(November 10, 2003) The statistics are depressing but very real. At least some of your clients — or their family members — will suffer a heart attack, stroke, cancer, diabetes or some other critical illness. While the need for critical illness insurance (CI) has resonated with some clients, advisors still need to do more to get the message across, according to Alphonso Franco, president of the Critical Illness Centre.
Speaking to attendees of Advisor Forum in Vancouver last week, Franco urged advisors to start by owning the product themselves. “It’s a crime to sell CI to people when we ourselves don’t own it,” Franco noted, referring to the more than half of the attendees who admitted they don’t own a CI policy. Franco not only has CI in place for himself, but he has sold more than 2,400 policies in the last three years alone.
Then, it’s as simple as asking your clients some open-ended questions. For example, Franco recommends asking business owners if their business would continue to be profitable without them. Also inquire what their bank’s lending policy is for someone who has just had a recent heart attack, stroke or cancer.
Questions like these will get clients thinking more about their financial future and will engage the client in more discussion — and hopefully action. “Clients may have RRSPs and other investments, but all of those things are in jeopardy if they come down with a critical illness and have to cash in those investments to pay for healthcare,” Franco notes.
A Desjardins Financial Security National Health survey released last month confirms that dire scenario. Thirty-nine per cent of Canadians surveyed say they wouldn’t be able to cover healthcare costs should their health deteriorate.
• • •
Be sure to check back to Advisor.ca this week for the remainder of our coverage from Advisor Forum in Vancouver. To register for Advisor Forum in Toronto (November 18-19) or Halifax (December 3-4), please click here or be sure to revisit our site for new reports from these events.
• • •
Deanne N. Gage is managing editor of Advisor’s Edge and can be reached at dgage@rmpublishing.com.
(11/10/03)
(November 10, 2003) The statistics are depressing but very real. At least some of your clients — or their family members — will suffer a heart attack, stroke, cancer, diabetes or some other critical illness. While the need for critical illness insurance (CI) has resonated with some clients, advisors still need to do more to get the message across, according to Alphonso Franco, president of the Critical Illness Centre.
Speaking to attendees of Advisor Forum in Vancouver last week, Franco urged advisors to start by owning the product themselves. “It’s a crime to sell CI to people when we ourselves don’t own it,” Franco noted, referring to the more than half of the attendees who admitted they don’t own a CI policy. Franco not only has CI in place for himself, but he has sold more than 2,400 policies in the last three years alone.
Then, it’s as simple as asking your clients some open-ended questions. For example, Franco recommends asking business owners if their business would continue to be profitable without them. Also inquire what their bank’s lending policy is for someone who has just had a recent heart attack, stroke or cancer.
Questions like these will get clients thinking more about their financial future and will engage the client in more discussion — and hopefully action. “Clients may have RRSPs and other investments, but all of those things are in jeopardy if they come down with a critical illness and have to cash in those investments to pay for healthcare,” Franco notes.
A Desjardins Financial Security National Health survey released last month confirms that dire scenario. Thirty-nine per cent of Canadians surveyed say they wouldn’t be able to cover healthcare costs should their health deteriorate.
• • •
Be sure to check back to Advisor.ca this week for the remainder of our coverage from Advisor Forum in Vancouver. To register for Advisor Forum in Toronto (November 18-19) or Halifax (December 3-4), please click here or be sure to revisit our site for new reports from these events.
• • •
Deanne N. Gage is managing editor of Advisor’s Edge and can be reached at dgage@rmpublishing.com.
(11/10/03)
