What can you get with RM 2,500 per year?

In one of the appointment’s I had yesterday, I reviewed a policy that this guy, aged 27 already had in place for the past 4 years.

His currently paying almost RM 2,500 per year for this policy but was quite puzzled why the policy only provided RM 100,000 worth of  life insurance & another RM 100,000 worth of critical illness.

Based on my calculation, at the age of 23 (the time when he took the policy) for RM 2,500 per year, he should be able to get at least double the amount of coverage! Now, of course there is nothing wrong here in the terms of premium or is there any swindling going on but, the issue is that for the premium that he is currently paying, he should get a lot more in terms of life insurance that what is currently in place.

So, where did the figures go wrong? No where actually. Why? The trade off here is in the policy cash value at the end of 20 years.

For RM 2,500 per year at RM 100,00 life insurance & RM 100,000 critical illness coverage, the policy cash value at the end of 20 years is projected at RM 57,000.

IF we double the benefits up to RM 200,000 for life & RM 200,000 for critical illness, the policy cash value at the end of 20 years will only amount to RM 37,000. An RM 20,000 difference.

Question is, which is more important, the insurance coverage OR the policy cash So, I asked my prospect, “What was your main objective when you purchased this policy?”

He immediately answered “To protect myself against unexpected events”

To strengthen this, based on his financial needs analysis that we did yesterday, he currently needs RM 300,000 worth of life insurance instead of just the current RM 100,000.

So, if you have 1 or more policies that you keep under your pillow or locked up in a safe somewhere at your in laws, just take them out once every 2 or 3 years & do a review with your agent.

If he or she is not available, you can always email me. ehm ehm..

Ezry’s (Atuk) Wedding in Felda Sendayan

The food was tasty, especially the cencalok. But the gulai udang masak cili api was also scrmptious. The attendance was more than 40. Not a bad figure considering our logistics.

Here are some pics of the event- a pic of everyone except the bride & groom (haha! i kinda missed that one). You can view the whole album on my flickr page.

Nokia Communicator E90

For all you gadget freaks out there who already own a Nokia Communicator (9500, 9300 or 9300i)… the successor has ARRIVED!

Here is the latest innovation by Nokia!

Recently unveiled at the 3GSM World Congress 2007 in Barcelona by Nokia President and CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo, the E90, boasts a 3.2MP bulit in camera, 3G connectivity, GPS, Wifi, Btooth & loads of other additional features which makes it a MUST have for the mobile executive.

It should reach Malaysian shores by the 2nd quarter of this year. Stylish in black, I personally guess the introductry price to be in the range of RM 2,500 to RM 3,500.

Recently, I have had thoughts of purchasing the 9300i which is retailing around RM1,500 at the moment but the E90 says it all.

Just can’t wait to get the feel & hold of it. For more detailed pics & specs :

http://europe.nokia.com/A4346040

Among the new key features :

 

• Browse the Internet and transfer media-rich files via HSDPA (up to 3.6 Mbit/s enabled) and 3G high-speed mobile broadband
• Increase mobile productivity with applications for browsing and editing documents
• Talk on every continent with quad-band GSM and automatic switching between bands
• Access voice and data functions quickly and easily with convenient shortcut keys
• Locate meeting venues, restaurants, and places of interest with the integrated GPS
• Send images captured with the integrated 3.2 megapixel camera with flash and autofocus
• Quickoffice tools with editors
• Maps application for location-based services
• Nokia Office Tools 1.1 (including Active notes)
• VoIP 2.1
• Download! application for add-on application download
• Support for Nokia Intellisync Mobile Suite
• WorldMate, Wireless Presenter, and Global Race – Raging Thunder – available for download via Downloads! application

   

For all you educators out there…

The ability to believe in yourself is the most important factor to be successful in what you do.Without belief, the most simple things in life might be totally impossible to achieve.

 
Another personal trait of successful people is passion. In the context of my duties as an educator & administrator, passion is the ability to see beyond the potential of each student and each staff who are under my responsibility. Passion also means doing whatever it takes to get the job done right, on time, every time. 

 
After more than two decades in this profession, I have come to realize that sometimes,
limitations that have been set before us are the main obstacles which hinder us from going beyond our expectations. I strongly believe that if given a chance & with proper guidance, even the worst student or staff can be taught to appreciate the values in life.

This is based on my past experience when dealing with students who come from rural areas, poor backgrounds & broken homes. You might be wondering how poor they are, to give a simple example, they can’t even afford a proper meal for recess what more to buy a decent pair of shoes for school.

 

Ensuring that students pass with flying colors or getting a place in university is not all that it takes to ensure that a student will eventually be successful in life.

There are a lot more values which they must acquire such as discipline, determination,personality and self confidence that will make them successful in whatever they do.

The same goes for the staff. As an administrator, I must ensure that I act in their best interest & do my part in assisting them to attain whatever is necessary to run the school properly with the highest level of integrity & commitment towards the teaching profession. They must also be given responsibilities/tasks/projects to exploit their career potential.

 
Passion also lies in the joy & satisfaction that I get when I receive a note or letter or call from a previous student who is now successful in life. I also receive calls once in a while from previous colleagues/staff (teachers & support staff).They usually do so just to say “Hi!” or “thank you, Cikgu”.

That alone to me is worth more than a salary increment or promotion because I know that by doing what I do every single day, using all the potential and resources that I have, I make a significant positive difference not only on the lives of my students and staff but also on the lives of their friends, families and loved ones.

 
This, I believe.

 
Thus, I can confidently say beyond a shadow of doubt that I do have what it takes to take on greater challenges in this wonderful profession of education.

How was your CNY?

I went back to my parents place in Tampin.

Had a big family barbeque with a dozen cousins & family members. Our close neighbours (15 surrounding houses) are all chinese. Funny thing is that it was their affair but we totally outnumbered them.

One major visible fact was that there were 10 cars in our driveway over the 2 day period! That’s the beauty in Malaysia. No matter whose festive celebration it is, we all benefit. We benefit from the sales, the variety of food, the time off from work & the opportunity to  enhance & strengthen relationships (family & friends) – at least 3 times a year.

Since food is always a main attraction during this festive season, we can enjoy ourselves but always be cautious of what we eat as there are limitations that the body is able to absorb.

One funny experience was the eve before CNY when we heard very loud non stop explosions coming from the next door neighbour. Although its illegal to burn firecrackers/fireworks, our culture is such that we will try every avenue to make it ‘legal’. Anyway, we all dashed out of the house & were amazed to see fireworks just near our front lawn that resembled what you would see at KLCC on new years eve.

Very colorful, very artistic & full of smoke. haha! It lasted almost 10 mins but just as we were enjoying the ’show’ a police patrol car showed up & the ‘guilty’ neighbours were questioned. All in good spirit of the festive season, the issue was settled without any violence or dissatisfation. I assume they were given a warning but the show did end just there.

Otherwise, there might have been more fireworks to see that night…

Irresistible Proposal

2 weeks ago, I asked an old friend for some advice on how I could extend my services to a larger group of people compared to the existing clients that I currently have. I asked him,

“What would be your major concern when deciding to sign up for life insurance?”

He gave me some good answers such as :

• the best value for money
• the best plan to suit his needs/financial goals in life
• a plan that is within his budget range
• the quality of service/easy administration of the policy
• a full time agent
• updates on the current market trends

The main intention I asked him the question was to honestly get an outside view from someone who was not in my list of clients. I genuinely wanted to know what are the major concerns that are playing around in the prospect’s mind – especially in the mind of a young executive like him & also some others I had a chance to ask.

It was my personal initiative to further enhance the level of services which I provide to a client. Many others shared their views on this & their concerns were summed up as stated above.

But one point that really got to me was this :

“Naz, since I am considering to take up some additional life insurance, why don’t you send me a proposal… and please, make it so irresistible that I can’t say NO.”
To tell you the truth, for a few days, it boggled my mind that based on some fact finding I had done with him previously, what could so possibly be truly outrageous & irresistible that would make him say YES & sign up with me.

Yes, there is the usual plus points of the wide array of financial tools in my arsenal, the strong company that I represent & the years of experience that I have in the field, but this was the first time I was posed with such a challange.

What did I do? I asked another friend who was a client & this is what I said :

“Bro, what do you think made my proposal so irresistible that you had no hesitation to sign up for a policy with me more than 3 years ago?”
Well, apart from the fact that I had bought him lunch a couple of times & introduced him to some wonderful new friends, this is what he had to say :

“The main irresistable point that I can think of regarding the purchase of life insurance until today is the fact that at that point of time, I was still insurable & it was cheaper too…”

So it struck me there & then that he did have a huge point, because today, more than 3 years later, we do have close friends who are no longer insurable due to medical reasons or class of work.

And I must also state that it is so irresistible that I had prospects who were diabetic, had hypertension & some other medical conditions who were willing to pay 5x the normal premium just as long as they could have their insurance policy issued.

The case of uninsurablity will not only effect you but also your famliy. Imagine when…

• your widow will not have enough money to keep the whole family united under one roof
• your children mightnot get a decent education
• your hard earned assets that your worked all your life for have to be sold to cover your medical expenses & pay your debts
• your close relatives might have to chip in to help your family get by in life

But that’s just it, by then, the window of opportunity to be insured will be CLOSED forever… so DO NOT let it happen…

& THAT is what I have come to learn as the IRRESISTIBLE factor in signing up for life insurance…

Corporate Logo (from an email)

I am not sure how many of you have noticed a hidden symbol in the Federal Express logo:

Yeah, I am talking about the ‘arrow’ that you can see between the E and the x in this logo. The arrow was introduced to underscore speed and precision, which are part of the positioning of the company.

-o0o-

The SUN Microsystems logo is a wonderful example of symmetry and order. It was a brilliant observation that the letters u and n while arranged adjacent to each other look a lot like the letter S in a perpendicular direction. Spectacular.

-o0o-

The above logo is for an editing studio. I like the way the logo attempts to convey what they do.

-o0o-

The above are two magazines from the Readers Digest stable. Again, the attempt to communicate what it is about quite figuratively through the logo catches my attention.

-o0o-

I liked this logo of a hair stylist for the cheeky humour it brings to the (dressing) table.

-o0o-

 

This was a logo created for a puzzle game called Cluenatic. This game involves unravelling four clues. The logo has the letters C, L, U and E arranged as a maze. and from a distance, the logo looks like a key.

-o0o-

This logo is too good. For the name Eight, they have used a font in which each letter is a minor adaptation of the number 8.

-o0o-

Eighty-20 is a small consulting company which does sophisticated financial modeling, as well as some solid database work. All their work is highly quantitative and relies on some serious computational power, and the logo is meant to convey it.

People first guess that 20% of the squares are darkened, but that turns out to be false after counting them. The trick is to view the dark squares as 1’s and the light squares as 0’s. Then the top line reads 1010000 and the bottom line reads 0010100, which represent 80 and 20 in binary.

Kinda like the surreal green screen of The Matrix, they want us to read stuff in binary

-o0o-

This was a logo designed in-house for some internal event at IBM. I like that they are quite relaxed about the logo, unlike certain other companies who do not like the logo to be tampered with in any way even for internal promotions.

-o0o-

 
You might think the arrow does nothing here. But it says that amazon.com has everything from a to z and it also represents the smile brought to  

the customer’s face. Wow, that is quite deep.

Income Protection

Another week, another meeting with the whole consulting team.

To enhance our level of services, we shared & exchanged ideas.  The main topic today was income protection – on how many people out there already own 3 life policies but are still inadequate should the unexpected happen.

If I asked you these questions, would you meet me up for a 30 min discussion on your insurance portfolio? Here are the questions :

1. If something were to happen to you tomorrow,  to the extent that your income would stop immediately, how much cash would you need on a monthly basis to cover your personal & family expenditures?
2. What have you done to take care of this problem?
3. If I could show you a way on how I can help you to protect your income so that you would have enough money to spend every month for the rest of your life, would you be willing to take action?

Have you ever thought of these situations? Give it a try!

“Is it ok for you?”

This was a question that one of my old friends asked me when he called me to sign up for life insurance 2 weeks ago. He has been married for almost a year & is expecting his first child soon.

After all was explained & he was clear of the terms & conditions, he finally asked me if it was ok for me if he waited until the end of this to pay the premium & I told him this :

“This insurance policy is for you, not for me. Yes, I do get compensated by my company if you purchase this policy but the small amount of comission that I make is no where near the amount of benefits that you & your family shall receive in the future.

I truly understand that it may cost you a bit now but let me warn you that you cannot afford NOT to have it now. And should anything happen to you between then and the day you have this policy in place, your family  and some of our close friends might just hold me guilty for it. This is from 2 personal experiences with 2 of our other friends.

I really do care about you & your family because we have known each other since we were kids. So I tell you what, if you are really on a tight budget, you can take all of my earnings from this policy now & pay it to me later as long as you have it in place immediately because I will not be able to sleep peacefully at night, knowing that you have no protection at all.

If you think that my company is not your best option, then by all means, get a policy from another company but please, do it immediately because your family depends on you.”

I’m sure that by now you would have guessed that he took up the policy on the same day & was approved & inforce 3 days later. I can now sleep peacefully that I have protected not just another friend but also the welfare of his family.

And, just FYI, he paid in full because looking at the figures (because I don’t think he could look me straight in the eye & tell me that he could not afford RM 2.45 a day), it was really a small price to pay for a huge peace of mind…

Quote : Money

“You can get everything money will buy without a lick of character, but you can’t get any of the things money won’t buy- happiness ,joy, peace of mind, winning relationships, etc., without character.”

-Zig Ziglar-