Join the Funding is Dead Movement
At Client Care Academy, we are starting a movement. It’s simple: Funding is Dead. You read that right. Funding is dead. It causes frustration and can deteriorate profits. If funding is dead, what’s the alternative? Asset alignment, verification and tracking.
To kick off the death of funding, we attended WealthCounsel’s Symposium last week, and we had a blast! We met so many new people and had great conversations about the importance of an ongoing client care program and the frustrations surrounding funding. Vinnie and Kristin presented on Funding is Dead, and this was the spark to light the fire about how we can end funding and move to something more profitable: asset alignment, verification and tracking.
If you were at Symposium and attended Funding is Dead, we hope you enjoyed it! For those of you who didn’t attend or missed the presentation, we wanted to give you a brief overview of what Funding is Deadmeans and how our SAVeTTMProcess and new SAVeTTMWorkshop (open to CCA Alum and new CCA members) will help you clear the funding hurdle. We know that funding is one of the top frustrations for firms and our SAVeTTMProcess will remove funding from your firm and move you to asset alignment.
During the Funding is Deadpresentation, before we presented our solution, we asked two questions:
1) What’s the most important thing we, as estate planning attorneys, need to know when somebody dies?
2) What’s the last thing we track, as estate planning attorneys?
The answer to both: the assets. We all know this, yet the estate planning community does not have systems to make sure that we know what the assets are when someone dies, until now. Let’s break down SAVeTTM:
Simplify– Due to each financial institution’s unique record-keeping, compliance requirements and documentation, transferring assets after death becomes increasingly cumbersome the more institutions that are involved after death. So, we encourage our clients to consolidate assets. We even go as far as to counsel our clients about which institutions and banks to work with based on who we have deemed as “friendly”. Interestingly, our counseling of clients regarding institutions surprised many at Symposium.
Align– Instead of “funding a trust,” assets must be aligned consistent with the plan, this must be done on a case-by-case and asset-by-asset basis and should be done by your firm. Clients may have great intentions to do this themselves, but never get around to it and many financial planners are limited in both knowledge and ability to align assets.
Verification– Obtain verification from the institutions (on the institution’s form or letterhead). This is critical. If records regarding ownership or beneficiary designation differ, financial institution’s records will control without court intervention.
Track– Assets must be tracked on a regular basis and there should be review meetings with clients.
This process may sound like a huge undertaking, but in our firm, we have seen immense success. We are more efficient, streamlined, and profitable. Our team is no longer overburdened by “funding”. Additionally, we have seen how trust administration has become smoother and quicker.
Through our SAVeTTMWorkshop (September 23-24, 2019) you and your team will learn how to streamline the process of tracking assets and having systems in place to know the assets at a client’s time of death. Our non-attorney team members will give guidance and answer questions you may have about their firsthand experience. This revolutionary process we will teach in the workshop in September will increase your profits, build long-term relationships with clients, and give you the tools to finally clear the funding hurdle and remove frustration from your firm.
If you’re a CCA Alum or are new to CCA, we encourage you attend this workshop! It is vital to increasing the profitability of your current ongoing client care program and sets firms up to smoothly begin a new client care program (which we can also coach you on in our October workshop).
Funding is dead. Join the movement – don’t keep spinning your wheels and stop spinning your wheels and say good bye to aggravation as a team!
Want to learn more? Click here to read our one pageron the SAVeTTMWorkshop and sign up for our SAVeTTM: Funding is Dead Pt 2webinaron August 28, 2019 at noon.
We hope to see you September 23-24, 2019!
Keep an eye out for the launch of our new website this month!