What is your File Management System?

As a broker or financial advisor, you deal with a lot of files. Your clients send you documents of all shapes and sizes on a regular basis. With such a high volume and wide variety of documents, an effective file management system is vital.   There are a number of different ways that brokers tend to approach file management, with varying levels of complexity and success. Ultimately though there are two types of file management system in a brokers office; one paper and one digital. Each of these systems have their own benefits and their...

read more

Most Brokers Make the Same Data Backup Mistakes

Brokers and financial advisors have a lot of data to deal with. They receive documents of all shapes and sizes from their clients, from payslips and letters to annual bank statements. Data backup and storage are key challenges that brokers need to overcome. Unfortunately, at the moment, a lot of brokers are struggling with data backup. They either don’t back up their data or they back it up in an ineffective manner. A lot of these mistakes are common to most brokers, and in most cases they’re costing them money. No Data Backup Plan The...

read more

Brokerprove (Compliance made easy)

“Brokerprove” =”Compliance made easy” Today Brokers are faced with many new and changing regulatory requirements following the global and local Irish financial crisis. It is understandable from a societal perspective that creating trust and confidence in our financial systems and services is essential and that business and consumers alike are willing to go back into the market for whatever services they need. That said the demands on Brokers & Advisors are ever increasing as regards paperwork, records ,processing information and...

read more

Brokerprove and the Shredder

Files build up. It’s a fact of life for brokers and financial advisors, the more clients you have, the more files you have to store. So successful brokers have stacks and stacks of files. There a few problems that come with this success, and a big stack of files can be a real problem. As a broker you’re required to keep a copy of all of your clients’ documentation for 6 years after a case closes. The more cases you deal with, the more clients you have; the more space you’ll lose to old case files. So how do you deal with this problem? For...

read more

Can I make routine searching for Documents in my brokerage business a productive activity ?

As I meet with broker clients, whether a one person operation or a large professional practice, a common theme has emerged about the time wasted searching for documents. Both the professionals and the back office team loose productive time searching to find the correct documents one of the team needs, this may be related to a client query or a need to reference  during a client meeting out of the office, or perhaps to confirm compliance or provide a supplier with some important policy or client information. The challenge is often the same in...

read more

Cloud can be better than local for document access and retention

The question came up many times when I have spoken with clients and prospects: Is my data safe in the Cloud? I normally respond with another question: What do you do today to secure your data? Most clients tell me their data is stored on their server behind a firewall, and on PCs and laptops belonging to their staff, with some local storage and some access to server data. Some also have business applications such as document or case management systems of which data may be stored locally on their application server or in more recent years they...

read more