TRAK  Makes Retirement Education Easy

Melinda Boat, AIF®, AIFA®, QPFC, QKA began her career in retirement planning in audit and compliance roles, designing plans and testing for compliance. Today, Boat has a client-facing role as Senior Vice President of Client Relations for Plexus Financial Services. She leverages all her expertise in qualified retirement plans with corporate clients, primarily in Chicago, Dallas and Oklahoma City.

TRAK is Easy to Run

Boat approaches plan sponsors with sample TRAK reports to illustrate what they could be sharing with their plan participants. Once plan sponsors agree to have her manage their retirement education process, she uses TRAK to run Gap Statements and Contribution Analysis Reports. Every participant receives both reports in a sealed envelope.

“Importing the census data is so easy. TRAK puts it all into PDF files, so it’s very fast,” says Boat. “Putting all the reports into envelopes actually takes longer than running the reports.” Boat chooses to print the reports because she knows that many participants won’t go online to review their retirement account. “I actually have clients who request that I run these reports every year, like clockwork, because their participants are requesting them.”

TRAK Reports Resonate

“Everyone knows they need to save more, but they usually don’t know whether they are on track to retire,” explains Boat. The one-page Gap Statement provides a nice setup to the Contribution Analysis report. She likes that TRAK reports illustrate what a participant is currently doing, present the likelihood of success, and suggest what else a participant should be doing, such as changing the deferred contribution percentage.

TRAK is Easy to Learn

According to Boat, TRAK is pretty intuitive. She did not receive any formal training, but rather taught herself to use the software. Whenever she has a question, she calls TRAK support. “Everyone at TRAK is so nice and they are never too busy to help me figure something out over the phone,” she says. “The service is great.”

Why Melinda Boat Recommends TRAK

She recommends TRAK to other advisors. “TRAK has made a tangible difference in the success of employees planning for retirement. In terms of preparedness for retirement, our country is in dire straits. TRAK really helps people understand the need to change their thought process around retirement planning.”