From time to time, I come across a particular advice situation that looks good on the surface but has some serious outcome risks for clients.

This question is a bit of a dichotomy: Self-serve helps us manage our workload and focus on the stuff of being an adviser, but at the same time, self-serve directly reduces some of the value we provide.

Many people reading my articles might think I'm grumpy and cynical, and sure, what you see here usually points out some problem or issue.

I talked about the case for Golden Life, which is one for life coverage and funeral planning. This is about the other benefits, risks, and needs.

Funeral plans are no longer a viable product, mainly because they have been deemed unreasonable contracts. One alternative is a Golden Life policy. Jon-Paul Hale explains.

If you're involved in medical insurance, you will be familiar with coverage for unfunded medicines on most new medical policies.

Adviser Jon-Paul Hale says it's time to review how commission is paid when clients move to a new adviser.

One issue the FMA has discussed is policy replacement and servicing commissions, which would remove the incentive for advisers to replace cover and get paid for the work they do.

Following my lengthy epistles on digital documents and management systems, I've been investigating this from the legal perspective.

Following on from my outline of the problem of digital document insecurity, I’m exploring how we can all improve this so we’re protecting clients and not unwittingly propagating fraud.

As many of you will have noted, lately, we've seen a distinct shift in providers' approach to document sign-off with digital signature systems.

Adviser Jon- Paul Hale reckons insurance company service levels have dropped to an appallingly low level across the industry.

Back in August 2023, Chatterbox responded with some pertinent thoughts, and I'm expanding on it.

We've seen the various discussions on nominated beneficiaries and the withdrawal of this with Partners Life some years ago.

Recently, I've had an interesting discovery with a client coming of age on their parent's policy, and they were transitioned to their own cover on smoking rates without any input or questions from the client.

Jon Paul-Hale looks into the issue of passbacks, and how they work.