Getting company support for all 50 credits

[DoppelGranger]

Long time listener, first time caller.....

I am having all kinds of trouble figuring out how to create a PD plan that takes place within a reasonable amount of time because I do not have any conversion credits, and my company (a large insurer) refuses to pay for more than one industry meeting in the same calendar year. :swear:

So I am left with the following undesirable options.... (1) Foot the bill for an additional industry meeting, or (2) wait until March/April 2007, when my employer will finally pay for another meeting.

Just to prevent questions about whether or not I have considered all possibilities, I will get 15 credits from the project, 15 from distance learning tapes of old SOA meetings, and 15 from this year's Spring meeting, leaving myself 5 credits short. Graduate classes, CFA exams, etc are just not applicable in my case so I don't think exam-validated credits will be an option.

Further complicating this whole mess is the fact that if I pay for a second industry meeting I can finish all 50 credits by the end of June and have a very good chance to get into the November FAC, whereas waiting for a 2007 meeting pushes me back to a FAC in mid to late 2007, after it has been extended by a day to include material previously covered on Course 7.

So I suppose I am mostly venting here, but I would also like to find out if there are any others who are putting together PD plans for all 50 credits and whether or not you are having similar problems with your employers. :wall:

[Math333]

Are you sure you can get all 50 credits without doing a project?

[DoppelGranger]

Are you sure you can get all 50 credits without doing a project?

I think my post was too long....:blah:

I said I was planning on 15 credits from my project, 15 from tapes of old meetings, and 15 from a meeting my company IS paying for this year. That only gets me to 45 though....

To directly answer your question, I'm pretty sure you cannot do a PD plan for all 50 credits (no conversion or exam-validated credits) without doing a project.

[wat?]

Are you sure you can get all 50 credits without doing a project?

Just to prevent questions about whether or not I have considered all possibilities, I will get 15 credits from the project...

He's got that covered.

[wat?]

I think my post was too long....:blah:

I said I was planning on 15 credits from my project, 15 from tapes of old meetings, and 15 from a meeting my company IS paying for this year. That only gets me to 45 though....

To directly answer your question, I'm pretty sure you cannot do a PD plan for all 50 credits (no conversion or exam-validated credits) without doing a project.

Would it be possible to somehow take an "extended vacation" and try and attend a meeting that's close to the Annual Meeting for additional credits? I haven't experienced PD yet, so I might not know what I'm saying.

Also, is the cost of attending one meeting that much of a burden on your costs? If you're on the US mainland, I'd imagine that there should be some meeting to obtain those credits for that's relatively nearby.

[DoppelGranger]

Would it be possible to somehow take an "extended vacation" and try and attend a meeting that's close to the Annual Meeting for additional credits? I haven't experienced PD yet, so I might not know what I'm saying.

Hmmm first of all I'm hoping to attend the Spring Meeting in June rather than the Annual Meeting in November (so I can get into a November FAC)....I just don't know what other meetings there would be either right before or right after the Spring Meeting that I could get PD credits from. If some such meeting exists I can certainly handle taking a few extra days to attend.

Also, is the cost of attending one meeting that much of a burden on your costs? If you're on the US mainland, I'd imagine that there should be some meeting to obtain those credits for that's relatively nearby.

Well that depends on what you mean. It's likely gonna cost me $1000 out of pocket to go to a second industry meeting this year. I can do it with minimal travel if I pick the right one (I am in mainland US, yes). Is that an impossible amount of money to come up with? No. As a matter of fact I'll probably end up dropping 100 Hamiltons just so I can be done with it. I'm just frustrated that my employer would pay for a second meeting if I wait a year but not if I want to attend this year.

Perhaps I am over-reacting and have no reason to be upset. I decided to post the question to get a feel for whether or not the student community agrees that this situation sucks, or if my hopes/expectations are unreasonable.

[wooHoo]

What about company training programs or local speakers. The other 5 don't have to be SOA Approved, so there might be non actuarial speakers that would tie in. I.e someone talking about investments or something.

For example, last night over in the UK, I went to a program that had 3 speakers talking about investment issues for pension fund trustees. I plan to use that for 1.5-2 credits of my PD.

[pepeTHEgrate]

1. anoter possibility is to attend actuarial club meetings (1-2.5 credits each).
2. webcast participation is possible.
3. you can be a presenter (may build up on your project presentation, which you'll have to do anyway).
4. but even $1,000 is good investment that will pay for itself in a few month, depending on your student program.
5. talk to your adviser

[3rookie]

Long time listener, first time caller.....

I am having all kinds of trouble figuring out how to create a PD plan that takes place within a reasonable amount of time because I do not have any conversion credits, and my company (a large insurer) refuses to pay for more than one industry meeting in the same calendar year. :swear:
How about they pay you next year for the additional meeting this year? Actually, the answer is still probably no. I agree that the company policy does not make sense. Maybe say that you'll pay the company $x000 if you leave before 2008?

[DoppelGranger]

1. anoter possibility is to attend actuarial club meetings (1-2.5 credits each).
2. webcast participation is possible.
3. you can be a presenter (may build up on your project presentation, which you'll have to do anyway).
4. but even $1,000 is good investment that will pay for itself in a few month, depending on your student program.
5. talk to your adviser

In response to #1, I get the feeling that my employer shares this opinion, that there are a wealth of local actuarial club meetings where it should be easy to find speakers covering topics applicable to my plan. Unfortunately, this is just not true. I regularly attend the meetings put on by the local actuarial association in my city. But these meetings are held less than once a month and cover all practice areas, so the chances of me picking up 5 credits one meeting at a time (each meeting is 1 hr) anytime soon are quite low. Especially when you consider the fact that not all speakers in my practice area will be covering topics that are really relevant to my plan. I estimate that I will be able to pick up 2 credits this way this year but not 5. This still leaves me 3 credits short.

In response to #2, I'm guessing that webcast participation is considered distance learning and I'm already at my limit for those credits. Even if it isn't distance learning, this again is something that doesn't exactly happen every day. What webcasts? When are they happening? Am I not looking in the right places for them? I don't know the answers to these questions.

As for #3, I did see in the rules that you can get 3 credits for a 1-hr presentation. However, I am almost certain that you cannot get these credits by presenting on part or all of your PD project. The project is worth 15 credits on its own and I highly doubt the PD committee would be receptive to someone trying to squeeze an extra 3 credits out of essentially the same work. So a presentation would have to be about something else altogether. Perhaps this is an option. In my specific situation I'm not sure exactly what I would be presenting on, but it's something to consider. Would have to be something pretty important and interesting to be able to put on an hour-long presentation though. Not sure if I have anything that isn't related to my project at this time.

#4, yeah OK, that's basically the decision I'm gonna come to is that I should just go ahead and spend a grand so I can be finished. Not happy about it though. By the way I'm the first person in my company to have to put together a PD plan with all 50 credits so this issue hasn't come up before - everyone else was able to finish their plan with only one industry meeting. And of course #5 is happening but I'm the one that has to figure this out and to be honest I'm the one who is much more familiar with the rules and the structure of the PD program because I've had to try to figure all of this out.

Please don't get me wrong pepe, I appreciate the suggestions, I just don't know that any of them are gonna be the silver bullet I'm looking for here. Sadly for me, I probably won't find that bullet.

Oh and 3rookie, that's an interesting idea but includes the presumption that I'm planning on sticking around until 2008. That's becoming less likely as this thing drags on. I haven't even been able to submit my initial plan yet because I don't know how I'm getting to 50 credits! Besides, the way my employer handles reimbursements, they would never go for something like that. I like the way you're thinking though, basically try to cut a deal somehow.

OK who made it to the end of this post? :yawn: Sorry I just have a lot to say about this because I'm frustrated. Thanks again for the ideas. If anyone else is in my situation please let me know, I'd love to hear about it.

[DoppelGranger]

So I finally decided to pay my own way to a second meeting. Just said goodbye to $925 out of pocket. :cry: Oh well - here I come, November FAC!

[Katie.]

Can you get your company to reimburse you next year for the meeting? If it's about budget, if you don't get the money until next year, it shouldn't matter to them if you don't go to any additional meetings.

Just don't be like me and wait too long to submit your executed plan.

[DoppelGranger]

Unfortunately my company is a little weird and doesn't do ANYTHING on a reimbursement basis for the students. Not books, exams, seminars, nothing. Everything must be approved up front and paid for with a company check. So that wouldn't work for me either.

[Katie.]

Sorry to hear it. Do you at least get a raise or bonus for finishing PD or your FSA? I guess it will be nice for you to be done anyway. Corporate bureaucracy sucks.

[DoppelGranger]

Corporate bureaucracy sucks.

Agreed. And yeah, there's a bonus for finishing PD and a separate bonus for finishing FSA including FAC. And that's nice of course. But I still feel like I got robbed of a sum of money that is significant to me but more or less inconsequential to the company, even in the small budgets of our department. Is there a smilie for feeling like you got hosed?