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Connecting GrandView with Your People

By Kelly Morgan, CFP®

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Welcome March! If you have been reading my notes over the last couple of months, GrandView is working with clients to get their financial information organized at home. The main reason for this is in case of an emergency and we define that as a potential natural disaster (hello Alabama weather!) or a health event which could happen at any age.

If you’ve been with us for a while, you know we ask questions about your family and keep up with kids and grandkids. In many cases, we know your family – they have been in the office, become clients or know us outside of the office.

A secondary reason is for convenience – you may want us to share information with another advisor like a CPA or Estate Attorney or begin communication with a family member. You may not rely on a family member because they live far away and have a friend you rely on.

So where am I going with this? Well, we need to have a point of contact or two or three “in case of emergency”. We have three avenues to keep on file so different situations.

Trusted Contact

A trusted contact person is intended to be a resource for GrandView and LPL in administering accounts and protecting assets.

The trusted contact is a person designated by the client as a point of contact if we are concerned about financial exploitation. The trusted contact can also be a valuable resource to us if we are unable to reach you after multiple attempts, or if we have concerns about your health.

By designating a trusted contact, you authorize GrandView or LPL to contact that person for limited reasons, including:
• We are unable to contact due to natural disaster, health, or other circumstances.
• Unusual requests or activities indicate a health issue or fraud.

A trusted contact does not have power of attorney to make decisions or to make changes to an account but can provide limited information to help establish communication channels and keep accounts secure.

Personally Identifiable Information (PII)

PII is the next level up from Trusted Contact. Personally Identifiable Information (PII) is information that can identify an individual. The information includes a unique identifier, including but not limited to name or Social Security Number, from which you can identify a person and potentially gain access to private information, accounts, etc. Some examples of PII include but are not limited to:

• Postal address
• Email address
• Social Security Number
• Driver’s license number or state-issued identification card number
• Date of birth
• Financial account number
• Credit or debit card numbers (with or without the security code)
• Personal identification number/password that permits access to a financial account
• Passport number

Having a contact listed as PII gives GrandView and LPL permission to share information with them. For married couples or partners, we would need to have PII on each of you to share information – it is that important. An added convenience is if you are in a bind and we need to forward information to an attorney or CPA, we can keep those contacts on file and

Legal Documents

We request our clients to keep your legal documents on file at our office. Believe it or not, we are typically one of if not the first call made when something has gone array. Many times, we are not able to share anything with the person calling and that includes a spouse or partner. For one reason or another, the clients never gave us the information. By having these files, we get an insight into who you rely on and how your estate will be directed.

At a minimum, having an updated Power of Attorney (POA) on file at GrandView will save us (you and GrandView) lots of time if it needs to be activated. A POA is a legal document that allows someone else to act on your behalf. By designating an “Agent” or decision maker, they can make critical financial decisions like requesting money that you may need. A POA can be put in place temporarily or permanently and the POA is terminated if the person passes.

Documents we like to keep on file:

  • Last Will and Testament
  • Power of Attorney
  • Healthcare Directive
  • Trust Documents (if applicable)

So, all of that was wordier than I wanted but important. The difference in use and level of information we can disclose is important for us to help everyone understand. Over the last year, as part of our meeting prep, we have been checking to see if we have all of this in your file and do beneficiary audits on your accounts. And we will keep asking because things are always changing and there may be new accounts we need to cover. We will keep sending information out about getting organized throughout the year.