You pay for your own cover
Health insurance, life cover, income protection - plenty of owners pay for these personally when the business could legitimately be paying. Nobody told them it could.
Eolas Business · For the people who own the business
Your business has got you here. Now it needs to look after you.
Financial planning for business owners in Ireland, whatever the size or sector. Jim starts with you and your family - what you want the years ahead to look like - then works back up to the business that pays for it: what it should be funding, what it should be protecting, and what the decisions you make now will mean years from here.
- 25 years
- Jim's experience planning with business owners
- To age 90
- How far ahead your family's money is modelled
- One invoice
- To the business, for the company's planning and your own
- Any size
- From a one-person consultancy up. What matters is that you own it
How the money flows
The business is how. Your family is why.
Most advice stops at the company, or at you as its director. Jim starts at the far end - what you and your family want life to look like - and works back up to the business that pays for it.
- 1
Your company
Protects itself, and puts its spare cash to work.
- Shareholder agreements
- Share buy-back insurance
- Key person insurance
- Holding-company mortgages
- Investing cash the company holds
- 2
You, the business owner
What the company can pay for that an employee's salary never could.
- Pension funding, before and after retirement
- Death-in-service cover
- Health insurance
- Executive income protection
- Small Benefit Exemption
- 3
You and your family
What all of it is for.
- Your Future View, modelled to age 90
- Children's education
- Mortgage protection and serious illness cover
- Investing what the family holds
- Making the most of household income
One engagement, one invoice. The planning for the company, for you as its owner and for your family is all invoiced to the business.
The Future View
See where you're heading, while you can still change it.
Your accounts tell you how last year went. The Future View looks the other way: Jim maps your family's money year by year to age 90 as things stand, then shows you what the same years look like with a plan behind them.
- 01
One picture of where you're heading
The business, your pensions, your savings and what life costs, drawn as one line from today to age 90. Most owners have never seen it all in one place.
- 02
Then the same picture, planned
Jim reworks it with you: what the company could be paying for, what it should be setting aside, when you could really stop. You see the difference on screen, not in a report.
- 03
Decisions you can make now
The point isn't a forecast. It is knowing what the business should be paying for, setting aside and protecting this year, while there is still time for it to matter.
Your family's money, to age 90
Illustrative example for a made-up business owner aged 50, showing the family's money from now to age 90 with and without a plan. With Eolas Money: The money lasts, with about €300k left at 90. Without a plan: The money runs out at 82.
The money lasts, with about €300k left at 90. The company funds your pension, the cash it holds is put to work, and you stop at 62.
The money runs out at 82. Work to 65, with the business paying for little beyond your salary.
Could this be you?
What don't most owners know until someone asks?
You can't look up the answer to a question you don't know to ask. These come up again and again in a first conversation with Jim.
“The business is my pension”
It may well be. The question is what happens at home if the sale is smaller, or later, or doesn't come - and whether anything else is being built alongside it.
You've left your shares to your business partner
Two co-owners had looked after each other in their wills. The shares were worth around €1.5 million, and a business partner who isn't family can inherit very little of that tax-free. An agreement, funded by insurance, does the same job properly.
The worry is at the kitchen table, not in the boardroom
One couple were anxious about paying for college years away from home. The answer turned out to be two layers up: cash sitting idle in their holding company, which could buy the property instead.
Examples of the situations Jim meets, with details changed. What is right for you depends on your own circumstances, and is worked through with your accountant.
Your advisory team
Your accountant looks back. Your planner looks forward.
A business owner needs three experts in their corner, and each does a different job. Jim doesn't replace your accountant or your solicitor. He works alongside them, and brings the part neither of them is there to do.
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Your accountant
Looks back. The accounts, the tax and the payroll for the period just gone, done properly and on time.
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Your solicitor
Is there for the transactions. An agreement to draw up, a property to buy, a dispute to settle.
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Your financial planner
Looks forward. What the business needs to do for you and your family over the next ten, twenty and thirty years - and stays with you for all of them.
- 01
Discovery call with Jim
45 min · freeJim Stapleton takes the call personally. You talk about what you and your family want the years ahead to look like, and he shows you on screen how the Future View works.
- 02
What matters, in writing
Within 5 working daysYou tell Jim what is most important to you. The engagement letter confirms what he will do about it, the fee and what you will receive. Nothing starts until you have signed it.
- 03
Getting the facts together
2–3 weeksCompany accounts, pensions, existing cover, who owns what. Jim talks to your accountant directly, so you are not carrying messages between them.
- 04
Your Future View
2–4 weeksYour family's money modelled year by year to age 90, then tested against your own what-ifs, so you can see what each decision does before you make it. The recommendations and the written report come out of the model, not the other way round.
- 05
Doing it, and staying
OngoingJim puts the recommendations in place with your accountant and solicitor, then keeps the model up to date as the business and the family change, year after year.
Book a call with Jim
A real planner, not a chatbot.
Common questions
The things owners ask before engaging us.
Anything not covered here? The 45-minute call with Jim is the right place to ask - bring the awkward ones too.
How is Eolas Business priced?
Eolas Business is time-based and invoiced to the business. After the discovery call you get a written engagement letter within five working days setting out what Jim will do, the fee and what you will receive, and nothing starts until you have signed it. The one engagement covers the planning for the company, for you as its owner and for your family.
Is my personal financial planning included?
Yes - it is the point of Eolas Business. Jim builds the financial plan for you and your family first: what life costs, when you want to stop working, what you want to do for your children. Then he works back up to the business that pays for it - what the company should be funding, protecting and setting aside. It is one engagement, invoiced to the business.
Does my business need to be a certain size?
No. Eolas Business is for anyone who owns a business or a share in one, from a one-person consultancy to a company with a full team, in any sector. Jim plans for the people who own the business rather than for the business itself, so headcount and industry don't decide whether it fits. Whether the business is profitable enough to do more for you is what the discovery call is for.
Will you work with my accountant and solicitor?
Yes, directly, and from the start. Your accountant looks after the accounts, tax and payroll for the period just gone, and your solicitor handles each transaction. Jim adds the forward view: what the business needs to do for you and your family over the next ten, twenty and thirty years. Company accounts, pension entitlements and existing protection are gathered with your accountant, and reliefs on a sale are sequenced with the accountant who will be claiming them.
Who looks after group pensions and employee benefits?
Leah Maguire, Financial Planner at Eolas Money, looks after group pension schemes and employee benefits such as death-in-service and group income protection. Jim Stapleton works with you as the owner on your own plan. If a scheme for your staff comes up in that conversation, Jim introduces Leah and she takes it from there.
Will I be dealing with a person or a chatbot?
A person. Jim Stapleton, a Certified Financial Planner with 25 years' experience planning with business owners, takes every Eolas Business discovery call himself and stays your planner afterwards. The modelling software is a tool Jim drives with you on screen; the questions, the judgement and the advice are his.
Message Jim directly
Tell Jim what's on your mind, he'll tell you where to start.
A few lines on the business, the family and what you're wondering about - a sale on the horizon, profit sitting in the company doing nothing, whether you could stop sooner than you think. Jim replies personally.
- Jim reads these personally and replies from their own inbox.
- It goes to Jim, not to a chatbot or a call centre.
- Time-based and invoiced to the business, scoped in writing before any work starts.
- Prefer to talk? 052 612 9696
Start with a conversation
You've looked after the business. Time it looked after you.
Book a 45-minute call directly with Jim. Bring what you and your family want the next ten or twenty years to look like - he'll show you what the business can do about it, and what it would take to do it properly.