Help for your unemployed clients

If you have clients that have recently been pinkslipped, or are anticipating it may happen soon, here are some recent stories that will help you ask the right questions, and help your clients cope.

Advising laid off clients: My financial planning practice is a diverse one. Since 1995, more than 80% of my business has involved working with clients who have been laid off or have retired early. To give you an idea of the magnitude of my work, I stopped counting after my 20,000th client.

Jobless clients need your help: Dealing with the laid-off investor requires more than just a few encouraging words and a quick look at the finances, though—a client loses a job, the advisor becomes part therapist, part financial planning guru.

Help clients cope with unemployment: Taking stock of a fired or laid off client’s situation means doing or re-doing a risk analysis.

Severance package options: Managing cash flow, tax implications and the overall hit to any financial plan when a client is downsized or laid off can happen only if they think to come to you during this stressful time.

Help laid off clients save on tax: In the last recession, more than 300,000 Canadians received a pink slip in a span of eight months And some who lost their jobs also had to deal with large sums in severance, and the uncertainty of what to do with it.

Avoiding debt in trouble times: If there was any time for an advisor to be on top of their clients’ affairs, it’s right now. With more Canadians losing jobs, the markets regularly bouncing around and home prices more volatile than ever, advisors have a perfect opportunity to show their value by helping clients deal with all this uncertainty.

Staff

The staff of Advisor.ca have been covering news for financial advisors since 1998.