Editor: This summer saw fires ragin...

Editor: This summer saw fires raging in the Okanagan and a power outage onward the East Coast. (In nearest month's Cover Story, several Kelowna CAs will share their stories.) level those of us fortunate enough to not be directly affected were forced to consider our confess emergency preparedness and wonder: "What would I do?"

While financial ruin may not be as life-threatening as a natural disaster, it can have a devastating impact forward anyone's life, so in this month's FF&MM we consider at emergency preparedness as it relates to finances.

Securing the future

A auspicious business owner is too busy running his business to sum up anyone about his plans for succession. A retired executive fails to descry the need for a formal financial plan when she already has "enough." A wealthy heir thinks he's too young to ne a will. Any single of these examples could be a disaster in the making.

Thankfully, BC's accountants and other financial professionals are working hard to bring "disaster planning" to the top of the financial agenda with their clients. by way of taking steps now to stop worst-case scenarios from destroying client wealth, these professionals are helping to confident the future of both individuals and businesses across the province.

A recipe for disaster

As an estate planning specialist with 25 years in the industry, David meeting-house TEP, of CIBC Wood Gundy has seen his fair share of financial disasters, and it no longer surprises him to proper wealthy clients who haven't prepared for the worst. "Some of them just have an estate plan in their head-but nobody other knows it," he says. "And of those who say they do have a plan, frequently what they consider to be their plan is just their will."

Temple points abroad that this problem is particularly for the use of all among business owners. An possessor might have considered the topic of estate planning, for instance, yet that's usually as far as it goe "It's undivided of those things," Temple says. "People say, 'Someday I'll master around to it,' but it just none happens."

Larry Bisaro, CA, a principal with D & H assemblage in Vancouver, agrees that business possessors seem especially vulnerable when it ensues to financial disasters. Why? Bisaro attributes the puzzle to the way owners think about business produce "People think incrementally: 'Let's gain the business started; let's secure it up and going; let's have a success," he explains. "Only after they've been felicitous do they move on to the nearest step."

Bisaro cautions that this kind of approach can lead to question s later on: "You have to plan [for succession] early and continuously from one extremity to the other of the life of a business. frequently people aren't doing that."

Jack Arnold, CA, a principal with MacKay LLP in Surrey thinks the complacency with regard to disaster planning petioles in part from the way holders perceive disaster. Arnold explains his position by way of talking about insurance. "You don't ne insurance until you ne it," he says. "That's the point in dispute with insurance: you spend the circulating medium and it's gone, and you have nothing tangible unles there's a disaster."

This can be a major barrier for about clients-particularly those with a frugal mindset. As Arnold points public many owners seem willing to accept more risk than they should, to avoid paying for something they will likely at no time need.

To the rescue

Obviously, overcoming like resistance presents a serious challenge for financial professionals, which is to what end Temple is a firm believer in making disaster planning a top priority at client meetings. "Probably nine public of ten clients, once they've done a plan, are quite satisfied that they've finally accomplished it," he offers

But as the saying goe the devil is in the details. Melanie Frer CA, sole-proprietor of Meyer Frer & Co in Burnaby, points without that when it comes to communicating the benefits of disaster planning, professionals must use the art of mild persuasion.

"You have to exhibit the client the value in [disaster planning]-what's in it for them," she says.

One arrangement that has worked well for Frer is focusing in succession the positive. Pointing out everything the client is doing right makes it a fate easier to focus on those issues that still ne work. "Once you've said a small in number [positive] things they relax," she explains. "They be perceived good about themselves. They're more able to listen to you."

Bisaro agrees that disaster planning requires special consideration from professionals, and that professionals ne to perform the operations indicated in a deep understanding of client goals and a vigorous relationship with the client-a relationship that goe beyond business. "You're talking about life issues: life, death, marriage, family," he relates. "Those issues aren't something you talk about with someone you appropriate once a year."

But unruffled then there's no guarantee this approach will issue in a formal disaster plan. "We've had clients who we've sat down and given a really dutiful plan, and then a two of months later they bring up the same problem" Frer admits. "You ready the problem, and you furnish a solution. You say: 'This is what I would do.' Then it's up to them to decide."