Peace of mind through financial confidence

AFS Insights: AFS News

Planning for Incapacity

Incapacity.  For many people, it’s not something they want to discuss, never mind prepare for.  Some people trust in their families or the government to look after them while others are simply confident it will never happen to them.  In the end though, there is only one person responsible for making your wishes known: You…. Read more »

No Tax Status Change for Employee Health and Dental Plans

The Federal Government was looking at the taxation of health and dental plans as part of their Spring 2017 budget.  In a review, it was estimated health and dental plans as a source of tax reform could raise as much as $2.9 billion.   With the proposed changes, employers or employees would pay tax on their… Read more »

The Clawback Conundrum

Most people’s retirement income includes government benefits that can be clawed back or forfeited altogether if their reported income is too high. There are several ways you can reduce your reported income to maximize benefits in retirement. To learn more about this important planning area, check out this article: The Clawback Conundrum If you’d like to… Read more »

Manage Your Energy, Not Your Time

As demands at work increase, employees often increase hours to keep up with workflow.  The age-old adage “the early bird gets the worm” may not have as much applicability today as it once did, or at least not at the cost of charging up one’s energy levels… In this fascinating article from the Harvard Business Review, Tony Schwartz and Catherine… Read more »

Teaching Children About Money

Speaking with your children on the importance of managing money seems to be a topic the majority of parents bypass.  Many parents will either push away the financial conversation or just neglect to have it at all.  The fact is starting the conversation at a young age and continuing it during different stages of your… Read more »

Celebrating Financial Literacy Month – Part 3 of 3

Earlier this month, we shared some links to our favourite articles explaining basic financial concepts  and gave you some tools to help you better understand and manage your personal finances. To wrap it all up, we want to  share some of our favourite personal finance websites for you to explore: Practical Money Skills Get Smarter… Read more »

Employee Benefits Plan Administration

With all businesses, your workforce evolves as time goes by.  The Plan Administrator is responsible for keeping your benefits plan up-to-date, to ensure your employees receive their full benefits coverage and the correct premiums are being paid. Employee benefit plan administrators are often different in every business.  Administration may be handled by the owner, accountant,… Read more »

Celebrating Financial Literacy Month – Part 2 of 3

Last week, we shared some of our favourite articles explaining basic financial concepts. This week, we have a few tools for you to use to help you better understand and manage your personal finances: Worksheets to Hone Your Money Management Skills A Variety of Helpful Tools and Calculators Guides to Common Financial Questions Tools and… Read more »

Celebrating Financial Literacy Month – Part 1 of 3

November is Financial Literacy Month, an initiative hosted by the Financial Consumer Agency of Canada to empower Canadians to achieve their financial goals through better education and understanding of financial concepts. To help you get started, we wanted to share these four articles which do a great job of explaining some basic financial concepts all… Read more »

Two Tips in a Low Interest Rate Environment

Every day we read stories in the media about the impact of low interest rates on Canadians.  It doesn’t appear rates will be rising any time soon.  So, what should we do?  Many of our clients are wondering how low rates will affect them over the short- and long-term.  Following are a couple of key… Read more »