The Healthcare of Ontario Pension Plan (HOOP) recently commissioned Abacus Data to poll 3,500 participants on their current thinking about saving and planning for retirement. David Colette, Abacus CEO said in a briefing on the poll results that 70% of the respondents are looking to retire sooner and … [Read more...]
What We Are Doing? by Mark Etherington
In following the theme of Paul Etherington’s Trusted Advice post entitled, “What we are Seeing", our focus over the last year has been to assist our corporate employee and executive benefit and pension clients to fully understand and utilize the options within their plans in light of the changing … [Read more...]
An Old And Reliable Friend
These past four plus months have created many shocking developments for families, businesses and communities around the globe; offset in some small way by acts of kindness, inclusion and courage which provide hope for a more equitable and just world post pandemic. One of these latter emerging … [Read more...]
A Great Time to Talk
In the normal scheme of things most employee and executive benefit and pension plans tend to wander from their initial design. Almost without fail, the original relevance of these programs to the corporation’s mission statement diminishes, either because the company’s philosophy has changed or the … [Read more...]
Continuing Employee Benefit Coverage & Premium Flexibility
Canadian insurance companies are striving to provide small businesses some flexibility in continuing benefits coverage to their employees Similar to many financial institutions, Canadian insurance companies recognize that we are living through the greatest social, economic and health challenge in … [Read more...]
Tuesday Talks with Mark Etherington: Your Greatest Economic Asset
For most of us, our greatest economic asset is not our home, our RRSP's or our stock portfolio, but rather it is our health and with it our ability to earn an income. When you look at our potential to earn an income over the course of our lifetime we each have the ability to generate a sizeable … [Read more...]
New drug benefit program coming to Ontario
A new drug benefit program is coming to Ontario in January of 2018 which will provide the roughly four million Ontarians under the age of 24 with publicly funded drug coverage. The announcement, made by the Government of Ontario in the April 27th, 2017 Budget, outlined the new … [Read more...]
Philanthropic Giving in Canada Part 6 – Recap
As we have noted in the first article of this series, the three most significant motivating factors behind a donor's gift are a compassion for those in need; a belief in the cause and the tax effectiveness of the gift. Charities and "not for profits" need to develop an understanding of and respect … [Read more...]
When Marketing Your Benefits Plan – Are Those Savings Real?
We are often asked by our group health & dental clients if completing an RFP on their plan will result in savings? Invariably the answer is yes! However that yes comes attached to the fact that at the first renewal much of those savings will disappear. It is important to understand what … [Read more...]
10 questions to answer when reviewing the benefits plan offered to your employees
While there are many variables to consider when reviewing your benefits plan, we believe the following 10 questions will help guide you towards designing the right plan for your organization: What is the “Purpose” of the Plan? Do the benefits align with your company’s overall mandate? Does your … [Read more...]