No analysis, no recommendation. Why I don’t look after anything I don’t know.

Five points for people with 30 seconds to spare

1. I don’t look after anything I don’t know. Anyone who wants a recommendation gets one as soon as I have the full picture.
2. Without an up-to-date picture, service is double the work. Handling every premium increase would begin with a questionnaire. Neither of us can afford that, and neither of us wants to.
3. The analysis is a product in its own right, with its own price. You choose the areas, the fee depends on the scope. Families don’t pay twice.
4. The analysis has an expiry date. Three years. In the Service Concept it never expires, because we update it every time we’re in touch.
5. The analysis and the Service Concept form the perfect symbiosis. Anyone who always knows what’s going on in a client’s life can offer proactive service instead of reacting.

The long version, for one or two cups of coffee.

The house whose insurance is getting more expensive

A letter in the letterbox. The buildings insurance is going up in the new insurance year. You write to me asking whether it’s cheaper elsewhere. A normal question, and exactly the kind of question you have a broker for.

To answer it, I need information about your house. Year of construction, floor area, type of construction, the roof, when it was last renovated. If I have all of that, the alternative is quickly calculated. If any of it is missing, I send a questionnaire, wait, follow up, wait again. One reply turns into two weeks and three emails, and a simple service becomes a costly process.

Every single premium increase would start like this. With the buildings insurance, with the indexation of an occupational disability policy, with every adjustment a contract goes through over its lifetime. Double the steps, double the work, every single time. That is something neither of us wants to afford.

I don’t look after anything I don’t know

My clear business principle. I don’t look after contracts for people whose circumstances I don’t know. And I don’t recommend anything without knowing what for.

How am I supposed to know what you need if I don’t know where you stand? What your needs are, and whether the contracts you already have still fit them at all?

That is why every collaboration with me begins with an analysis. It is the tool that allows me to offer a credible service free from sales pressure in the first place.

Why does the analysis cost money?

I have described in two posts what ‘free advice’ really costs and why I don’t offer it. The analysis is the point where that becomes concrete.

A thorough analysis is hours of work. Anyone who does it for free and then takes the client on for ongoing service is busy for a long time before the first euro comes in. If any money ever comes in at all.

In the old world, this is solved by having a product at the end of the analysis that pays for the work. I deliberately do it differently.

The analysis has its own price because it is a product in its own right. Standardised so that it stays affordable, and detached from everything that comes afterwards. You receive a document that belongs to you. You could take it to any other intermediary. That is not what I hope for, of course.

I work with the standardised basic financial analysis for private households in accordance with DIN 77230. The standard specifies which data is collected and how needs are ranked. It sets the theoretical target value against your actual value. The result is a rational evaluation of your situation without a product sale attached. Should you then want to change something about your situation, you can properly compare my advice with the recommendations of the analysis.

What the analysis covers:

1. Introductory call. Free of charge, 45 to 60 minutes by video call. We get to know each other, talk about your expectations and my way of working, and see whether a collaboration fits. You then receive a complete quotation. Once you have accepted it and paid the deposit, the analysis begins.
2. Intake meeting (optional). If questions remain after the introductory call, we clear them up in a short meeting before the process begins.
3. Data collection. You fill in the topic-specific questionnaires and provide your documents on existing contracts, investment accounts and bank accounts.
4. Evaluation. From your information I determine the target value for each topic according to the rules of the standard, and from your contracts and accounts the actual value. The comparison shows, topic by topic, whether there is a gap and how large it is.
5. Summary. Your analysis report contains all the key information as well as the 42 topics in the order of priority set by the standard, each with its target and actual value.
6. Walk-through and handover. In a joint final meeting we go through your analysis topic by topic. You see your status quo and, at a glance, where there are gaps between target and actual.

You can find the full process on the analysis page.

You choose the areas for which you want the analysis prepared. The fee is based on that scope of work. For couples and families there is a family discount, because much of it doesn’t double just because there are two names on the cover.

The three-year rule

At some point the question comes up of how long such an analysis is actually valid. Sometimes out of genuine interest, sometimes with a calculator in hand to work out the break-even.

An analysis is valid with me for three years. That is not a regulation, that is my business policy. I see in my clients how quickly a life turns around in three years. Moving house, a child, a pay rise, going self-employed, a separation, an inheritance. From my own experience I know very well how fast-paced our lives can be.

Anyone who wants advice again after three years, without us having been in touch in between, commissions the analysis anew. Again by area, again at the price valid at that time. The world in three years is probably not the world of today.

And then there is the exception that is really the rule.

Why does the analysis never expire in the Service Concept?

Anyone who has given me a mandate under the Service Concept never buys an analysis a second time. Not after three years, not after ten.

The reason is simple. We speak several times a year. There is the annual review, there are the contacts in between, and at each of them I learn what has changed for you. A new address, a new job, the second child, the house paid off. We keep the picture up to date, continuously.

The analysis doesn’t expire because it never gets old. It is updated at every contact and reviewed in full once a year at the annual review.

And with that, back to the house from the beginning. In the Service Concept it works the other way round. The letter arrives, I know the house, I do the maths, and you get a message from me before you even have to ask.

That is the difference between reacting and acting. Without the picture I can only react, and even that only slowly. With the picture I can act before anything happens. That is my understanding of real service. Once set in motion, it runs on its own, steadily. Service that has to start from scratch with every letter is, for me, no service at all. Service is a system that runs because it was set up properly once.

And the analysis is the moment when it all begins.

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Want to know where you stand? Then let’s talk. The introductory call is free of charge. Afterwards you can decide whether we fit together and whether you would like to be looked after proactively rather than reactively.