Becoming a Client

Five steps: a thirty-minute discovery meeting, a suitability record, a design meeting, an application the insurer decides on, and annual service afterwards. You can stop at any of them, and at three of them stopping is a common and correct outcome. Nothing is charged at any stage, because the practice is paid a commission by the insurer if a policy is issued, which is disclosed here rather than buried.

Most people meet this process one step at a time and never see the shape of it. Here it is whole, including the parts where the answer is no.

Step one: the discovery meeting

Thirty minutes, online, no products. You describe your situation and get answers in plain language. If this does not fit, you are told so in that meeting rather than sent a proposal.

Nothing is prepared in advance. No illustration is produced, because a document projecting values decades out, written before anyone knows what the money is for, answers a question nobody has asked and tends to become the conversation instead of informing it.

The four things established are what the money is for, whether the cash flow is durable in a normal year rather than a good one, whether the plan survives a disability or a job loss, and whether this suits you at all. Frequently it does not. Someone without an emergency reserve, or carrying expensive consumer debt, or without stable surplus income, is usually better served dealing with those first, and will be told so.

Step two: your Financial DNA

The one piece of work asked of you: the suitability record a licensed advisor must complete before recommending anything. Not a sales form, and you decide what you share.

This is a regulatory obligation rather than a preference. An advisor who recommends an insurance product without establishing your needs, your financial situation and your tolerance for a long commitment has not met the standard the licence requires. It exists to protect you from being sold something unsuitable, which is the commonest complaint in this field.

You can decline to answer anything. What follows is that some options cannot be recommended, because a recommendation without the underlying facts is not a recommendation.

Step three: the design meeting

More than one route, walked through in plain language, with what the contract guarantees shown separately from what it does not. Deciding not to proceed is a complete answer.

The separation matters more than anything else on this page. A participating whole life contract has guaranteed values set at issue, and it may also receive dividends, which are declared annually at the insurer's discretion and are never guaranteed. Any illustration showing both must show which is which. If you are ever shown a single blended number, ask for the guaranteed column on its own.

A contract is designed at issue for a purpose and most of that design cannot be redone afterwards. One built to accumulate value quickly looks different from one built to maximise the eventual death benefit. That is why the purpose is established in step one and not here.

Step four: application and underwriting

The insurer decides, not the advisor. An application can be accepted, rated, excluded, postponed or declined. Nobody can promise you approval before underwriting.

Underwriting usually involves a medical questionnaire, sometimes a paramedical visit, and sometimes a request for records from your physician. It takes weeks rather than days. A rating means the insurer will issue at a higher premium because of a health or occupational factor. An exclusion means a specific cause is not covered. A postponement means they will look again later.

None of these outcomes is unusual, and none of them is the advisor's decision to make or to promise. Anyone who tells you approval is certain before an insurer has underwritten the file is telling you something they cannot know.

Step five: after the policy is in force

Reviewed with you every year, and available between reviews. Policy loans, repayment, a change in the participation scale, a house, a business, a child's education.

The annual review exists because the contract is long and your circumstances are not fixed. A policy loan is a contractual right, and it is a loan, which means it carries interest and reduces the death benefit until it is repaid. A change in the dividend scale changes what the non-guaranteed part of the contract does, and that is the moment to look at the plan again rather than the moment to worry.

How long the whole thing takes

The discovery meeting is thirty minutes. The suitability record is usually one sitting. The design meeting is an hour or so, and there is often a gap before it while the design is prepared properly.

Underwriting is the long part and the part nobody controls: two to six weeks is ordinary, longer if records are requested from a physician. From first conversation to a policy in force, six to ten weeks is a reasonable expectation, and anyone promising materially faster is describing the paperwork rather than the underwriting.

There is no advantage to hurrying. A contract designed in a rush is designed once and lived with for decades.

Where this can stop, and what it costs

You can stop at any step. At steps one, three and four, stopping is a common outcome and not a failure of the process.

Nothing is charged at any stage. The practice is paid a commission by the insurer if a policy is issued, weighted heavily toward the first years. That is a conflict of interest, it is disclosed here rather than at the end, and it is the reason the suitability record in step two is not optional.

Nothing on this page is personalised financial, insurance, tax or legal advice, and reading it creates no professional relationship.

What the practice needs from you, and when

At the discovery meeting: nothing. No documents, no figures, no statements. Thirty minutes of conversation, and you can end it having supplied nothing at all.

Before a design meeting: the suitability record. A licensed advisor may not recommend anything without one, and it is the only piece of work asked of you in the whole process. Income, obligations, what is already in place, what you are trying to do, and over what period. You decide what you share, and a refusal to answer a question is an answer the record can carry.

At application: what the insurer asks for, not what the advisor asks for. Medical history, and sometimes a paramedical appointment arranged at the insurer's cost. The insurer sets that list, and it varies with the amount of coverage and your age.

After the policy is in force: an hour a year. The annual review is where a change in the participation scale, a change in your circumstances, or a question about an advance gets dealt with while it is still small.

What happens if you stop

Before an application is signed, nothing happens. No file is opened, no fee is charged, and nothing is reported anywhere. Most first conversations end here and that is the normal outcome rather than a failure of the process.

After a policy is issued, the contract is yours. It can be surrendered, and early surrender can return less than was paid, which is the single most expensive way to discover that a contract was arranged for the wrong reason. That is why the suitability work happens before the application rather than after it.

A contract you cannot fund is worse than no contract. If the premium depends on income that is not durable, the honest answer at the design meeting is a smaller contract or none, and it is given at that meeting rather than discovered three years later.

There is one more thing worth saying about stopping, and it is the part people find hardest to believe until they have seen it. Nobody at the firm is compensated for talking a household out of a decision it has already reached. The commission on a policy that lapses in year four is largely recovered by the insurer, so a contract sold to somebody who cannot sustain it is worse than no contract at all, for them and for the practice. The incentives point the same way as the advice, which is not true everywhere and is worth checking wherever you are.

A last word on the shape of the relationship itself. The work does not end at issue and it is not meant to: the annual review is where a contract is kept aligned with a household that keeps changing. Incomes move, children arrive, businesses are sold, marriages end and begin. A contract designed around one set of facts and never revisited will still pay its death benefit, but it will not be doing the other things it was arranged to do.

A thirty-minute discovery meeting

A first conversation establishes whether this fits. No illustration is prepared and nothing is arranged.

Often the answer is no, and you will hear it during the call rather than in a proposal afterwards.

Hold a licence? To place business, deal directly with Canadian Wealth Creation Centre Inc. This page is for households.

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This form reaches Canadian Wealth Creation Centre Inc. Any meeting, any advice and any insurance product is provided by Canadian Wealth Creation Centre Inc., through its representatives certified by the Autorité des marchés financiers. IBC Financial is the company's education platform: it distributes no product and no financial service, and it gives no individualised advice.

Important disclosure

Dividends are not guaranteed. Dividends are not guaranteed. They are declared annually at the discretion of the insurance company's board of directors based on the performance of the participating account, and past dividend performance does not indicate future dividend results.
Here is what that means in practice. Every year the insurer's board looks at how the participating account performed, the investments, the claims experience, the expenses, and decides what dividend to pay. Some years it is more. Some years it is less. Nobody can promise you what next year brings. The guarantee in your policy comes from the contractual values, not from the dividends. The dividends are the upside. The contractual guarantees are the foundation.
It does not suit everyone. The strategies described may not be suitable for all individuals. Suitability depends on personal financial circumstances, cash flow, risk tolerance, time horizon and objectives that can only be assessed through individual consultation.
This does not fit everyone, and I would rather say so plainly than let you find out later. It depends on your cash flow, your time horizon and what you are actually trying to do. Some of the people who ask me about it should not do it, and I tell them that.
This is insurance, not an investment. Participating whole life insurance is an insurance product, not an investment. It is regulated as insurance under provincial insurance legislation. The primary purpose of life insurance is to provide a death benefit. Cash value growth and dividends are additional features that depend on policy design, premium payments, and the performance of the insurer's participating account.
This is an insurance product. Its first job is the death benefit. The cash value, the dividends, the access to capital, those are features of an insurance contract, and they are worth understanding. They do not turn the contract into an investment, and treating it as one leads people to judge it against the wrong yardstick.
Guarantees come from the insurer, not the government. The guarantees referenced are contractual guarantees of the issuing insurance company, dependent on the insurer's financial strength and claims-paying ability. They are not government-backed. Policyholder protection in Canada is provided by Assuris, within its published limits. The Canada Deposit Insurance Corporation covers bank deposits and does not apply to insurance products.
The guarantees written into a policy are real and they are contractual. They depend on the insurer standing behind them, which is not the same thing as a government guarantee. Know the difference, because it matters.

Common questions

Why choose this practice?

Because of what it publishes rather than what it claims. The arguments against its own subject are set out at the same length as the arguments for it. The provincial regulators are named alongside their public registers, so a reader can check the position rather than accept it. And the compensation is stated on every page: commission is received from insurers when a client purchases a policy, which makes this an interested party rather than a neutral one. Judge it on those three things rather than on an adjective. Behind them sits what a website can only show slowly: a family practice in its twenty-fifth year of licensed work, two advisors on the same files, and contracts arranged in the early years now old enough to show what they actually do.

What does the practice need from me, and when?

Almost nothing at first, and the requirement grows in one direction only. At the discovery meeting, nothing at all: no documents, no figures, no statements. Before a design meeting, the suitability record, which is the only piece of work asked of you in the whole process, covering income, obligations, what is already in place, what you are trying to do and over what period. At application, whatever the insurer asks for rather than what the advisor asks for, since the insurer sets that list and it varies with the coverage amount and your age. After the policy is in force, about an hour a year for the review.

Is there a charge for any of this?

Nothing is charged at any stage. The practice is paid a commission by the insurer if a policy is issued, weighted heavily toward the first years, and that is disclosed here rather than at the end of the process. It is a conflict of interest, and naming it is the point, because a meeting that costs you nothing is not a meeting given by a disinterested party. It is also the reason the suitability record is not optional. The safeguard against being sold something unsuitable is a documented record of your needs, not the good intentions of the person sitting opposite you.

How long does the whole process take?

Six to ten weeks from a first conversation to a policy in force is a reasonable expectation. The discovery meeting is thirty minutes, the suitability record is usually one sitting, and the design meeting runs about an hour, often after a gap while the design is prepared properly. Underwriting is the long part and the part nobody controls: two to six weeks is ordinary, and longer where records are requested from a physician. Anyone promising materially faster is describing the paperwork rather than the underwriting. There is no advantage in hurrying, because a contract designed in a rush is designed once and then lived with for decades.

What is the suitability record, and do I have to complete it?

It is the record a licensed advisor must complete before recommending anything, covering your needs, your financial situation and your tolerance for a long commitment. It is a regulatory obligation rather than a house preference, and it exists to protect you from being sold something unsuitable, which is the commonest complaint in this field. You decide what you share and you can decline any question. The consequence of declining is not a refusal to work with you. It is that some options cannot then be recommended, because a recommendation made without the underlying facts is not a recommendation. It is the only piece of work asked of you in the whole process.

Can the insurer turn me down?

Yes. The insurer decides, not the advisor, and an application can be accepted, rated, excluded, postponed or declined. A rating means the insurer will issue at a higher premium because of a health or occupational factor. An exclusion means a specific cause is not covered. A postponement means they will look again later. Underwriting usually involves a medical questionnaire, sometimes a paramedical visit, and sometimes a request for records from your physician. None of these outcomes is unusual, and none of them is the advisor's to promise. What this practice does instead is explain the likely position before the application goes in, and then explain the insurer's answer again when it comes back.

Can I change my mind partway through?

Yes, at any step, and at three of them stopping is a common and correct outcome rather than a failure of the process. Before an application is signed nothing has happened: no file is opened, no fee is charged, and nothing is reported anywhere. Most first conversations end there. After a policy is issued the position changes, because the contract is then yours and an early surrender can return less than was paid. That is the most expensive way to discover a contract was arranged for the wrong reason, and it is exactly why the suitability work happens before the application rather than after it.

What happens if I cannot keep paying the premium?

That is the failure mode this process is built to catch before it happens, which is why the durability of your cash flow is tested in the first meeting rather than assumed. Where a premium depends on income that is not dependable, the honest answer at the design meeting is a smaller contract or none at all, given then rather than discovered three years later. A contract you cannot fund is worse than no contract. If the situation has already arisen, contact the insurer and the servicing advisor before a payment is missed, because the options open while a policy is in good standing are wider than those open afterwards.