November 15, 2017

The Empire Life Immediate Financing Arrangement Webinar

Join us for the Immediate Financing Arrangement (IFA) Webinar on November 23, 2017 to learn about Empire Life’s partnership with Manulife Bank for CSV lending and how IFA can help meet the needs of your high net worth clients!

·        Date: Thursday, November 23, 2017

·        Time: 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM ET

Register now.

Launch of Empire Life Class Plus 3.0

Class Plus 3.0, the new Guaranteed Withdrawal Benefit product from Empire Life, is now for sale. And it’s supported by our new Illustrator. Discover how your clients can have Guaranteed Retirement Income for Life! Learn more.

Try our new online Class Plus 3.0 Illustrator

Our new Class Plus 3.0 Illustrator is simple and easy to use! It’s now online and can be run on your desktop, tablet or phone. Because it is web-based, you always have the most recent and secure version at your fingertips.

Features:

·        Improved graphics and layouts

·        Progress bar helps you track where you are in the process

·        Handy ‘go back' button to review or change data

·        Illustration summary to track your illustration inputs

Don’t forget to bookmark the page and to uninstall any previous Illustrator versions you may have.

Try now.

Next TRIIPSS Webinar: Federal Proposals Taxing Private Corporations Update: Overview, Concerns, Cautions and Opportunities

Federal Proposals released in July of 2017 were the most dramatic changes to the Income Tax Act affecting Canadian controlled private corporations in 45 years. This session provides an overview of the proposals and their updates as well as concerns, cautions and opportunities for business clients and their advisors.

Attendees will gain a clearer understanding of the ramifications of the proposals through a series of case studies. The session will also cover updates and changes to the original proposals and some next steps for practitioners and their clients.

·        Date: Wednesday, December 13, 2017

·        Time: 1:00 PM - 2:00 PM ET

Invitations with registration details will be sent to Advisors next week.

Continuing Education Requirements

It is important that all advisors understand and comply with provincial an territorial licensing requirements for continuing education (CE). The industry is focused on confirming that advisors are meeting their CE requirements. Insurance carriers will be randomly auditing advisors to confirm they are meeting all compliance requirements, including continuing education. For advisors in those provinces where you are required to submit your certificate numbers to the regulator as part of your license renewal, we will not require you to submit the same proof to us as part of your compliance review.

Please see Information Circular 2017-26 for more information.

Holiday hours and year-end settle dates

Please refer to the following information circular to learn more about our holiday hours of operations and year-end dates for Retail business.

Revised Commission Schedule

We have updated our commission schedule.

Please see our website for the most recent schedules, and see Information circular 2017-25 for more details.

Empire Life is pleased to announce another enhancement to the Fast & Full Investment Application!

Now available: Clients can now transfer funds from multiple relinquishing institutions to their new Fast & Full Investment application. A transfer form for each relinquishing institution will be created and submitted on your client's behalf by Empire Life. Learn more. 

Introducing the Fast & Full Investment Application Test Site

The Fast & Full Investment Application was developed to help advisors experience an easy-to-use, web-based tool that fast-tracks the segregated fund application and approval process.

Test drive the Fast & Full Investment Application:

·        Try our test site before using it with clients

·        Your opportunity to review real-life test cases

·        Experience the most up to date functionality

Hear what Fans of Fast & Full are saying about our Fast & Full Investment App.

To learn more about the Fast & Full Investment App visit fastandfull.ca/register

Earn CE Credits with TRIIPSS Webinars

You can earn Continuing Education Credits on TRIIPSS webinars you may have missed.

Learn more.

Our blogs have merged!

Empire Life and Empire Life Investments have merged their blogs! Need additional resources to help your clients? Sign up today to receive the latest insights on insurance, investments and financial planning.

ADVISOR COMPLIANCE REVIEWS

In December 2016, we advised you we would be reaching out to advisors to verify their compliance (Information circular 2016-28). With the introduction of an industry standard questionnaire which was released last month by the Canadian Life and Health Insurance Association (CLHIA), we are now ready to begin this new monitoring program.

We will be randomly selecting advisors to verify compliance through the completion of the questionnaire and the submission of supporting documentation. Participation is mandatory for contracted advisors. For advisors through an MGA, we will copy the MGA compliance officer on our communications with the advisor.

Where there are gaps in an advisor’s compliance regime, the advisor will be given 90 days to become compliant. If an advisor remains non-compliant after 90 days, their contract may be vested.

Should you have any questions about advisor compliance or this monitoring program, please contact the Distribution Practices team at distribution.practices@empire.ca

Empire Life announces Q3 2017 results

We issued a press release on our third quarter 2017 earnings. You can read the full release here.