INVESTMENTS AND BENEFITS

Shumway Insurance Group has been providing Employers with Group benefits solutions for over 50 years. Benefits today are more complicated than ever. Rapidly rising cost and new, constantly changing legislation have placed very onerous burdens on Employers. Shumway Insurance Group is committed to helping our clients navigate the turbulent benefits world with cost effective, innovative ways to provide quality benefits to your most important resource, your Employees.

Our experience ranges from groups of 2 to groups with over 9000 employees. No two Employers needs are exactly the same.

Benefits Brokered by Shumway Insurance Group:

All products are offered on a fully insured or partially/self-funded basis.

• Medical
• Dental
• Vision
• Life
• AD&D
• Short-Term Disability
• Long-Term Disability
• Cafeteria – FSA – Section 125
• Health Reimbursement Accounts (HRA)
• Health Savings Accounts (HSA)
• Voluntary Worksite Benefits
• State Health Exchanges (Avenue H)

Shumway Insurance Group has been providing Families Health Insurance solutions for over 50 years. Health Insurance today is more complicated than ever. Rapidly rising cost and new, constantly changing legislation have placed very onerous burdens on Individuals and Families. Shumway Insurance Group is committed to helping our clients navigate the turbulent Health Insurance world with cost effective, innovative ways to provide quality benefits for you and your family.

Soltis works with individuals & families to develop, implement, and manage sophisticated financial plans designed to meet their personalized needs and support them in pursuit of their life’s most important endeavors. Our commitment to independence and fee-only management allows us to act exclusively in your best interest as we provide unbiased advice and recommendations. We work in collaboration with your other trusted professionals to provide efficient and effective comprehensive financial services.

We start the Financial Planning process by listening to you and diligently seeking to understand your lifestyle goals and objectives. We want to know your priorities and develop a plan that aligns them with your financial resources so assets and cash flows are available to fund and support your goals when needed.

We work with you to lay out alternative financial plans and conduct risk and probability analysis to determine the strength of each. This will allow you to make informed financial decisions so you can move forward with clarity and confidence in your preferred plan.

The following are examples of some of the services and issues we can consider in developing your financial plan:

• Retirement and other significant transition analysis
• Cash flow analysis & modeling
• Tax planning and coordinating with your accountant to make better strategic tax and portfolio management decisions
• Risk management and insurance optimization analysis
• Education funding and options
• Stock option analysis and consulting
• Charitable planning analysis
• Estate planning and asset projections tool to be used in collaboration with your attorney to develop more effective and meaningful Estate documents

We work diligently to gain a holistic understanding of your financial resources and goals so we can design and implement strategies tailored to meet your individual investment needs. To assist you in meeting those goals we provide our proprietary institutional investment management process we refer to as: The Investment Management Discipline which consists of the following:

• Develop your Investment Policy Statement – After understanding your financial goals and objectives, we customize an Investment Policy Statement to align your objectives with customized portfolio strategies. Your IPS articulates details including asset allocation, performance expectations, risk characteristics, etc.
• Recommend Asset Allocation and Manager Selection – Based on your IPS, we give specific asset allocation and manager recommendations designed to best meet your goals.
• Implement – After further discussion and approval by you, we implement our recommendations using non-conflicted institutional partners to custody your assets so you can feel confident in the security and protection of your assets.
• Monitor and Review – We continually monitor the asset allocation strategies and the performance of all selected mangers to confirm their continued merit in your portfolio. Further, we review your plan with you and make adjustment when necessary as we progress steadily toward your goals year after year.

The tax impact on your current and future income as well as the tax implications of your investment strategies will have a significant influence on your ability to achieve your financial goals. We can help you protect a greater share of your wealth through sound tax planning.

We work with you in collaboration with your personal tax advisors to develop a tax-efficient financial plan so more of your resources are available to fund your financial goals. We help by understanding the tax impact of different types of income and how various coordinated tax strategies can optimize the use of your resources. The following are examples of how we can help:

• Advise on stock options evaluation: how and when to exercise
• Advise on distributions from your 401(k) or IRA: how, when, and what amounts
• Provide Roth conversion analysis: The pros & cons and strategies to optimize their effectiveness
• Recommend the best way to dispose of appreciated assets: sell, transfer or donate?
• Recommend the best way to manage or dispose of underwater assets: hold or harvest losses to offset current or future gains?
• Tax-Aware portfolio management: Low turnover equities, tax-exempt fixed income, gain and loss management, etc.

You have worked hard to build and retain your wealth. A well designed estate and gifting plan can provide tremendous asset protection, ensure your assets transfer to your intended beneficiaries when and how you want them to, and reduce or eliminate the risk of paying estate tax.

We help make the estate planning process clear and understandable, and suggest strategies that may optimize the use of your estate assets. We work in collaboration with your attorney to explore and coordinate your financial planning with your estate planning.

Charitable planning may bless the lives of those who receive your gifts but it can equally bless your life and the lives of your family if properly structured and implemented. If charitable giving is one of your life’s most important endeavors, let us assist you to determine how much is enough to meet your lifestyle goals so you can be confident in knowing the amount of your wealth that is available for charitable purposes. Perhaps more important than knowing how much you can give, is understanding the most effective ways to give to maximize your philanthropic goals. We can help you evaluate various strategies and collaborate with your estate planning attorney to ensure proper design and execution of your plan.

Charitable strategies we can help you consider include:

• Charitable Lead or Remainder Trusts
• Private Foundations
• Donor Advised Funds
• Cash vs. In-kind Gifting
• We are available to help you define your vision and create a strategy to align your charitable giving objectives with the resources you plan to give over your lifetime.

Improper estate planning or an unforeseen death or disability can jeopardize an otherwise well designed financial plan unless appropriate insurance policies are in place to properly mitigate those risks. Unfortunately, the complexity and quantity of insurance products available in the market make it difficult to find the appropriate solution for your unique situation.

Soltis does not sell insurance or receive any commissions related to insurance products so you can feel confident in our unbiased insurance analysis and recommendations. Our interest is to assist you in efficiently using your resources to meet your short and long-term financial goals.

Soltis consults with company executives and committees to provide leading Retirement Plan benefits to their trusted employees. Consultative services include investment management, plan design, plan benchmarking, vendor searches, and Fiduciary services (ERISA 3(21), 3(38)). Participant level services include education and communication, advice, and executive financial planning.

Our commitment to Retirement Plan clients helps them meet their Fiduciary responsibilities while providing their employees with tools and resources to meet their retirement goals. Our commitment to independence and fee transparency allows us to act exclusively in the best interest of our clients as we provide unbiased advice and recommendations. We work in collaboration with leading trusted institutional partners to provide efficient and effective comprehensive services.

Serving as a Fiduciary to a Retirement Plan requires care, skill, prudence, and diligence. It requires a level of knowledge in investment matters. ERISA requires fiduciaries to act solely in the interests of participants and for the exclusive purpose of providing participants with retirement benefits. ERISA holds Fiduciaries to a high standard in managing their plan’s investment options. As one court has said, and many have repeated: “The Fiduciary obligations to the participants and beneficiaries of the plan are…the highest known to the law”.

Plan Fiduciaries that are not qualified to fulfill their duties as an expert in all types of investments, seek for a qualified independent expert that acknowledge that they are fiduciaries to the plan; subject to the same duties under ERISA as the general plan fiduciaries. Plan Fiduciaries hire Soltis Investment Advisors and shift responsibility to them as an Expert Fiduciary under ERISA Section 3(21) and ERISA Section 3(38).

ERISA Handbook: “It is extremely important for all plan fiduciaries to understand their responsibilities and the potential penalties for shirking their responsibilities under ERISA. A Fiduciary can be held personally liable for breach or violation of these responsibilities, even to the extent of having to restore lost profits to the plan”.

An Investment Policy Statement (IPS) is valuable in mitigating risk of fiduciary liability by promoting better management processes that are introduced and monitored through the written process. The IPS establishes the charter, objectives, and policies and procedures that will guide the design, implementation, and monitoring a Retirement Plan’s investment program. It also assigns responsibilities and accountability to those involved in the making and implementation of the policies. Most important, the IPS instills a useful discipline into the investment process by requiring the fiduciary to formally articulate objectives and strategies for both the overall Retirement Plan and the participants whose interests are held paramount by the fiduciaries.

Soltis leads the process for creating and implementing an Investment Policy Statement (IPS) for Plan Fiduciaries. The process identified in the IPS is documented in a Fiduciary Binder and used to ensure that the investments are congruent with the plan’s overall charter; each investment offering being monitored according to a written prudent process.

Soltis provides a documented process for regular benchmarking of Retirement Plan features, plan design, fees, and Plan Providers. Each component of the Retirement Plan is marked to the market to provide the Plan Fiduciaries valuable information to maintain a competitive benefit for plan participants. This process allows the Fiduciary to fulfill the responsibility to maintain a Retirement Benefit that has reasonable fees. It also provides employees with a benefit that is attractive with competitive features to retain key employees.

Our independence allows Plan Sponsors to leverage our knowledge and expertise in selecting and monitoring Plan Service Providers. Soltis provides the Fiduciary with a documented process for the selection and ongoing monitoring of vendors for Defined Contribution, Profit Sharing, Defined Benefit, and Non-Qualified Plan Providers. Plan Sponsors hire Soltis to conduct Request for Proposals (RFP) and searches for Plan Vendors. The objectives and priorities of the Plan Sponsor are evaluated and utilized to select leading Plan Providers for the Request for Proposal.

Soltis provides plan design consultation to Plan Fiduciaries. Soltis works with Plan Fiduciaries to evaluate plan design alternatives and assist in aligning the retirement plan with the Plan Sponsors business strategy. A carefully designed retirement plan has the power to attract good talent and retain key employees.