Life insurance in Victoriaville
CWCC works with self-employed people, manufacturers, families and business owners in Victoriaville and the Centre-du-Quebec on life insurance, living benefits, succession planning and capital strategy: entirely online. The firm is registered with the Autorité des marchés financiers under number 602293, where Jose Salloum practises as a Financial Security Advisor.
What makes Victoriaville different
Victoriaville is a town of entrepreneurs as much as of factories, and that changes the protection question completely.
A strong manufacturing tradition. Furniture, processing, specialised products, with businesses that are often family-held and rooted here.
A great many self-employed people and small businesses. Subcontracting, trades, professional services, shops. Rarely a group plan.
A substantial agricultural base. Around the town, with the succession questions that come with it.
A stable community. Families settled for a long time, where the business and the house often belong to the same people.
Self-employed: what does not exist, and what has to be asked for in advance
This is the central question here, and it starts with an observation nobody enjoys making.
The layers you do not have
An employee at a plant here generally has several layers of protection stacked on top of one another: paid sick days, sometimes short-term disability, long-term disability, group life insurance and health coverage.
A self-employed person has none of those layers by default. A week not working is a week without income, and it starts on day one rather than after a waiting period.
The public net, and the enrolment that has to have happened first
There is a mechanism many self-employed people do not know about: certain special benefits under the employment insurance scheme, including those tied to illness and family responsibilities, can be available to the self-employed.
That access is not automatic. It requires a voluntary agreement entered into in advance, and a period passes between enrolling and the moment a benefit can be claimed.
The consequence is direct and admits no exception: you cannot enrol once you are ill. It is a decision to be taken while everything is fine, like a policy.
The conditions, the timing and the contributions belong to the scheme itself and they change: we do not describe them here and we invite you to verify them directly with the body that administers it. We flag the mechanism because a great many people have never heard of it.
The trap nobody mentions
Here is the most useful point on this page, and it concerns individual disability insurance.
A disability benefit is set according to the income you can demonstrate. For an employee, demonstrating it is simple. For a self-employed person or a business owner, the insurer generally looks at net income after expenses, not at revenue.
Many entrepreneurs legitimately arrange their affairs so as to reduce their net taxable income. That strategy, perfectly sound in tax terms, produces a side effect few people anticipate: the protection you will qualify for is calculated on that reduced income.
This is not advice to pay more tax. It is a matter of knowing the two decisions are linked, and of raising them with your accountant and with us at the same time rather than two years apart. It is a three-way conversation, and it belongs before the application.
When the business and the house are tied together
In a great many files here, the family home has served as security for business financing, or the business occupies a building the owner holds personally.
That interlocking means a difficulty on one side transmits immediately to the other. It is a fact to know when settling on an amount of protection, and the structure itself belongs to your accountant and your lawyer.
The Quebec framework
A death benefit payable to a named beneficiary is generally not part of the estate, which lets it be available while the rest runs its course.
Recall too that a common-law partner does not inherit without a will, however long the relationship has lasted, and that designating a married or civil-union spouse is in principle irrevocable unless stated otherwise.
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Jose Salloum Canadian Wealth Creation Centre Inc.
Read the guideWhat we do for self-employed people here
We start with demonstrable income rather than with a product, because that is what determines what you will qualify for. That conversation belongs with your accountant, and we would rather they were in it.
We then check whether you have enrolled in the public mechanism, and if not, we tell you where to verify its conditions yourself.
Finally we set the amounts on a full year of activity rather than on a good quarter.
The first meeting
Half an hour, by video, at no cost and with nothing to sign. Your accountant can attend, and that is often the most efficient meeting. At the end you will know what your demonstrable income allows, which is the real starting point.
Frequently asked questions
Is a self-employed person entitled to sickness benefits?
Certain special benefits under the employment insurance scheme can be available, but not automatically: it requires a voluntary agreement entered into in advance, and a period passes before a benefit can be claimed. You cannot enrol once you are ill.
What income will my disability benefit be calculated on?
Generally on the net income after expenses that you can demonstrate, not on revenue. An entrepreneur who legitimately reduces net taxable income will see the protection calculated on that reduced income.
Should I pay more tax to be better insured?
That is not what we advise. The point is that the two decisions are linked and are better taken together, with your accountant and with us at the same time, rather than two years apart.
What are the exact conditions of the public mechanism?
They belong to the scheme itself, they involve contributions and timing, and they change. We do not describe them here: verify them directly with the body that administers the scheme.
Do you meet people in Victoriaville?
All meetings are held online, and your accountant can attend. The office is in Laval and the firm is registered with the AMF under number 602293.
Are dividends guaranteed?
No. The scale is set each year by the insurer’s board according to how the participating account performed. What the contract records as guaranteed stays guaranteed; the scale varies.
A thirty-minute discovery meeting
A first conversation establishes whether this fits. No illustration is prepared and nothing is arranged.
Often the answer is no, and you will hear it during the call rather than in a proposal afterwards.
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About the author
Jose Salloum is a Financial Security Advisor (Conseiller en sécurité financière) licensed by the Autorité des marchés financiers in Quebec, by the Financial Services Regulatory Authority of Ontario, and by the Insurance Council of British Columbia. Licensed since 2001, he works with Canadian families, business owners and incorporated professionals.
He is the founder of Canadian Wealth Creation Centre Inc. (CWCC), registered with the AMF, and of its educational branch IBCFinancial.com. He holds the Infinite Banking Concepts® Authorized Practitioner certification from the Nelson Nash Institute, a private certification rather than a regulatory licence.
CWCC is not registered with CIRO and does not provide securities advice. This page is general education and not advice on any individual file.
Important disclosures
This page is education, not advice. The content is general information prepared by Canadian Wealth Creation Centre Inc. It does not take your circumstances into account and is not a recommendation to buy, hold or cancel any contract. CWCC is not registered with CIRO and does not provide securities advice. The firm places insurance in Quebec, Ontario, Alberta, British Columbia, Manitoba and New Brunswick; clients elsewhere are served by advisors licensed in their province.
Nothing here was written with your file in front of us. Read it to understand the subject, then judge it against your own situation, ideally with someone who is licensed where you live and who has seen your numbers.
Tax treatment depends on your own circumstances. The tax treatment described depends on the contract remaining exempt under the Income Tax Regulations and on the reader’s individual circumstances. A withdrawal, a surrender or a policy loan may be a disposition under the Income Tax Act, and amounts above the adjusted cost basis may be taxable in the year they occur. Tax rules change.
The tax result is not automatic and it is not unconditional. It rests on the contract staying within the Canadian rules and on your own situation. Before you rely on any of it, talk to an accountant who has actually worked with these contracts.
Guarantees come from the insurer, not from the government. Guaranteed values in a life insurance contract are contractual promises of the issuing insurer and depend on that insurer’s financial strength and claims paying ability. Dividends on a participating contract are not guaranteed, are declared at the insurer’s discretion and can change. Policyholder protection in Canada is provided by Assuris within its published limits; deposit insurance does not apply to insurance contracts.
The guarantees written into a contract are real, and they are the insurer’s. The dividend is not a guarantee at all; it is what the insurer decides to declare each year. Know which numbers are which before you make a plan around them.