Advisors prep for busy 2006

Whether it’s reminding clients to diversify, prepping for the baby boomer retirement migration, or just brushing up on client service and practice management techniques, advisors are primed and eager to move their businesses into 2006.

Lorne Schnell of Assante Capital Management in Regina will focus on creating more formalized processes on the business management side of his practice — in both Assante’s Regina and Saskatoon branches — including the integration of tax planning with money management and estate planning, particularly among his core of family business-owning clients.

The team of eight partners (four advisors and four administrative assistants) will spend much of 2006 rolling out their newly created wealth-planning processes and “binder” series, which Schnell likens to a checklist for clients. Broken into various sections with questionnaires, he says the purpose of the binders is to ensure advisors in both branches are serving clients suitably, especially in areas that, until recently, might not have received adequate attention.

Schnell cites insurance planning as an example where improved service will benefit clients in 2006. Too often, he explains, clients will mistakenly feel that owning insurance alone is enough of a safeguard within a portfolio — one that doesn’t require much follow up or discussion. But simply having insurance doesn’t mean the client’s looked after. “You may have insurance but it may not be structured properly, it may be too much, or maybe it shouldn’t be held by your corporation,” he explains.

Instead, Schnell and his team will start facilitating more focused conversations with clients to ensure such items are structured properly, especially when the work of business-owner clients is inherently risky. “We’re in the risk management business… we have to have those discussions, and the processes behind the binders will ultimately force those discussions on a regular basis,” he adds.

“It’s really holding our feet to the fire and showing the client a more formal process in terms of how you put their plans together. We were always pretty good at it, but we want to continue to do that in 2006.”

Debbie Ammeter, vice-president, advanced financial planning for Investors Group in Winnipeg, is preparing for the first wave of baby boomers to turn 60 in January. She plans to continue serving this clientele through the New Year and beyond, with a keen focus and practical planning vision. “It’s just such a big demographic trend that it’s going to be a really important planning issue for advisors now that the trend is here,” she explains. “Just managing the transition from employment to retirement for a lot of people is going to be a biggie.”

Ammeter says advisors should ask themselves: Are boomers prepared for retirement? What should advisors do to ensure they are? How do advisors plan for retirees in terms of their income streams and healthcare costs? Consider planning strategies as these clients are going through the different stages of retirement so that the service is customized, she suggests. For example, when doing pre-retirement planning, prepare projections based on variable expenses in different phases of retirement, based on the assumption that many people will have a more active phase of retirement at the beginning, rather than when, later into retirement health or aging issues may typically start to slow clients down.

“That may be a different phase of retirement spending,” she notes. “And then, even if healthcare costs, or long-term care costs start to kick in at some point, try to project and plan for those. Also place an emphasis on whether clients would be well served with living benefits like long-term care insurance and even critical illness insurance depending on their age.”