FP II — CSI Financial Planning II Exam Blueprint
Practical exam blueprint for candidates preparing for the Canadian Securities Institute CSI Financial Planning II (FP II) exam.
How to Use This Exam Blueprint
This page is an independent study checklist for candidates preparing for the Canadian Securities Institute CSI Financial Planning II (FP II) exam, code FP II. Use it to translate broad financial planning topics into practical exam-readiness tasks.
Work through the checklist in three passes:
- Coverage pass: confirm that every major planning area is familiar.
- Application pass: practise client scenarios, recommendations, and trade-offs.
- Final-review pass: target weak areas, formulas, documents, and decision rules.
Because exact official exam weightings are not provided here, the areas below are presented as readiness areas, not as guaranteed exam sections or percentages.
FP II Readiness Areas at a Glance
| Readiness area | What you should be able to do | Evidence you are ready |
|---|---|---|
| Integrated financial planning process | Move from client facts to goals, analysis, recommendations, implementation, and review | You can identify missing facts, prioritize issues, and explain why a recommendation fits the client |
| Client discovery and suitability | Gather relevant personal, financial, tax, estate, risk, and investment facts | You can separate essential facts from distracting facts in a case |
| Cash flow and net worth analysis | Build and interpret household financial statements | You can spot liquidity concerns, debt stress, savings gaps, and inconsistent assumptions |
| Tax planning | Apply Canadian tax logic to employment, investment, retirement, business, and estate situations | You can distinguish deductions, credits, taxable benefits, capital gains, eligible dividends, and tax deferral |
| Retirement planning | Evaluate retirement income sources, registered plans, spending needs, and longevity risk | You can recommend suitable savings, withdrawal, and income strategies |
| Investment planning | Match investment recommendations to objectives, time horizon, risk capacity, risk tolerance, and tax status | You can explain trade-offs among asset classes, account types, diversification, fees, and rebalancing |
| Insurance and risk management | Identify personal, family, property, disability, critical illness, long-term care, and business risk exposures | You can calculate broad coverage needs and select an appropriate type of insurance response |
| Estate planning | Recognize wills, powers of attorney, beneficiary designations, trusts, probate, liquidity, and tax issues | You can identify estate gaps and recommend professional follow-up where needed |
| Business-owner planning | Address compensation, incorporation concepts, succession, insurance, tax, creditor, and retirement issues | You can distinguish personal and corporate planning considerations |
| Education and special-purpose planning | Apply registered plan concepts and goal-based funding logic | You can compare account choices based on beneficiary, purpose, tax treatment, and flexibility |
| Ethics, compliance, and professional conduct | Recognize conflicts, disclosure needs, documentation standards, and limits of competence | You can choose the most client-centered and compliant action in a scenario |
| Integrated case judgment | Combine multiple planning areas into a coherent recommendation | You can justify sequencing: what must be done first, later, or by another professional |
Core Planning Process Checklist
Client Engagement and Discovery
You should be ready to answer scenario questions about what information is needed before giving advice.
- Identify the client’s stated goals and unstated planning issues.
- Distinguish needs, wants, constraints, and assumptions.
- Gather facts about:
- Age, marital status, dependants, residency, employment, health, and family obligations.
- Income, expenses, assets, liabilities, insurance, pensions, benefits, and tax position.
- Investment objectives, risk tolerance, risk capacity, time horizon, liquidity needs, and knowledge.
- Estate documents, beneficiaries, executors, attorneys, guardians, and charitable wishes.
- Business ownership, shareholder agreements, key-person exposure, and succession intentions.
- Recognize when more information is required before making a recommendation.
- Identify when a referral to a tax, legal, insurance, mortgage, or estate professional is appropriate.
- Document assumptions, client approvals, implementation responsibilities, and review dates.
Analysis and Recommendation Skills
| Candidate task | Ready if you can… |
|---|---|
| Prioritize issues | Rank urgent risks, legal gaps, tax deadlines, liquidity problems, and long-term goals |
| Evaluate alternatives | Compare at least two realistic strategies and explain trade-offs |
| Match recommendations to facts | Tie every recommendation to a client objective, constraint, or risk |
| Avoid overreach | Recognize when the planner should not provide legal, tax, or insurance underwriting advice beyond competence |
| Explain implementation | Identify who must act, what documents may be needed, and what order matters |
| Monitor the plan | State what life events, market events, tax changes, or family changes would trigger review |
Personal Financial Statements and Cash Flow
Net Worth and Cash Flow Readiness
- Classify assets as liquid, investment, personal-use, registered, non-registered, business, or real estate.
- Classify liabilities as short-term, long-term, secured, unsecured, fixed-rate, variable-rate, deductible, or non-deductible.
- Prepare a simple net worth statement.
- Prepare an annual cash flow summary.
- Identify whether a client has:
- Emergency fund weakness.
- Excess consumer debt.
- High housing cost exposure.
- Concentrated investment or employer risk.
- Inadequate savings rate.
- Unclear spending assumptions.
- Explain why positive net worth does not always mean strong liquidity.
- Explain why high income does not always mean strong savings capacity.
Useful Formulas
Net worth:
\[ \text{Net worth} = \text{Total assets} - \text{Total liabilities} \]Cash flow surplus or deficit:
\[ \text{Surplus or deficit} = \text{Total inflows} - \text{Total outflows} \]Debt service logic:
\[ \text{Debt service ratio} = \frac{\text{Required debt payments}}{\text{Gross or net income measure used in the question}} \]Be ready to interpret the result, not just calculate it. A ratio may be mathematically correct but unsuitable if the client has unstable income, dependants, weak insurance, or no emergency reserve.
Tax Planning Exam Blueprint
Tax planning questions often test classification, timing, account choice, and after-tax impact.
Income and Deduction Concepts
- Distinguish employment income, self-employment income, property income, pension income, dividends, interest, capital gains, and taxable benefits.
- Recognize that different income types can receive different tax treatment.
- Distinguish deductions from credits.
- Identify common planning logic for:
- RRSP contributions and deductions.
- Pension adjustments and contribution room concepts.
- Capital gains and capital losses.
- Interest deductibility.
- Income splitting concepts where permitted.
- Tax-deferred versus tax-free versus taxable accounts.
- Understand marginal tax rate versus average tax rate.
- Explain why an after-tax return is more relevant than a pre-tax return for many planning decisions.
- Recognize when tax minimization should not override suitability, liquidity, or risk management.
Tax Decision Prompts
| Scenario cue | What to check |
|---|---|
| Client asks whether to use RRSP or TFSA | Current tax rate, expected future tax rate, liquidity needs, contribution room, employer plan, retirement timing |
| Client has capital losses | Superficial loss concerns, carryover logic, matching against capital gains, portfolio suitability |
| Client owns non-registered investments | Interest, dividends, capital gains, adjusted cost base, tax efficiency, rebalancing impact |
| Client is self-employed | Deductible expenses, cash flow volatility, CPP/QPP-type contributions if relevant, insurance, retirement savings |
| Client owns a corporation | Salary versus dividends, corporate-owned assets, shareholder needs, succession, professional tax advice |
| Client is retiring | Timing of income, pension choices, RRSP/RRIF conversion, government benefits, tax brackets, withholding |
| Client dies with registered assets | Beneficiary, spouse or qualified beneficiary possibilities, estate liquidity, final tax return issues |
Tax Readiness Traps
- Confusing a tax deduction with a tax credit.
- Treating all investment income as taxed the same way.
- Ignoring adjusted cost base when discussing capital gains.
- Recommending a tax strategy without checking liquidity.
- Assuming the lowest-tax choice is always the best planning choice.
- Forgetting that tax rules may require current limits, forms, and professional confirmation.
Retirement Planning Checklist
Retirement Income Sources
- Identify possible retirement income sources:
- Employer pension plans.
- Group retirement savings plans.
- RRSPs and RRIFs.
- TFSAs.
- Non-registered investments.
- Government benefits.
- Annuities.
- Employment or consulting income.
- Rental, business, or family support income.
- Distinguish defined benefit and defined contribution plan features at a conceptual level.
- Recognize the effect of inflation on retirement income needs.
- Analyze longevity risk and sequence-of-returns risk.
- Explain why retirement planning should include health costs, housing, tax, estate goals, and survivor needs.
- Evaluate the timing of registered plan withdrawals.
- Recognize the planning impact of early retirement, delayed retirement, divorce, disability, or business sale.
Retirement Capital Need Formula Awareness
A simplified retirement capital need calculation may require present value or future value logic.
Future value:
\[ FV = PV \times (1 + r)^n \]Present value:
\[ PV = \frac{FV}{(1 + r)^n} \]Where:
- \(PV\) = present value
- \(FV\) = future value
- \(r\) = rate per period
- \(n\) = number of periods
For exam purposes, be ready to identify whether the question asks for:
- inflation-adjusted spending,
- capital required at retirement,
- annual savings required,
- after-tax income,
- or a comparison of retirement income sources.
Retirement Scenario Checks
| Client fact | Likely planning issue | Ready response |
|---|---|---|
| Large RRSP, little TFSA or non-registered savings | Future taxable retirement income concentration | Discuss withdrawal timing, account diversification, tax brackets, estate impact |
| Early retirement goal | Longer funding period and shorter accumulation period | Test savings rate, bridge income, insurance, pension reductions, inflation |
| DB pension with survivor option | Trade-off between lifetime income and survivor protection | Compare household needs, health, other assets, insurance, estate goals |
| High-risk portfolio near retirement | Sequence risk | Consider risk capacity, spending horizon, cash reserve, rebalancing |
| Business owner relying on sale proceeds | Concentration and execution risk | Validate business valuation, tax, buyer risk, succession plan, diversification |
| Retired couple with unequal assets | Income splitting and survivor planning | Review account ownership, beneficiary designations, pension options, estate documents |
Investment Planning Checklist
Suitability and Portfolio Construction
- Define investment objective: income, growth, capital preservation, liquidity, tax efficiency, or a combination.
- Distinguish risk tolerance from risk capacity.
- Identify time horizon for each goal, not just for the client overall.
- Assess liquidity needs and emergency reserves before recommending long-term investments.
- Match asset allocation to objective, risk, tax status, and time horizon.
- Explain diversification across asset classes, sectors, geography, issuers, and account types.
- Identify concentration risk, including employer stock, real estate, private business, and sector exposure.
- Explain the role of rebalancing.
- Distinguish nominal return, real return, pre-tax return, after-tax return, and risk-adjusted return.
- Recognize behavioural risks such as panic selling, overconfidence, anchoring, and recency bias.
Product and Account Fit
| Planning need | Possible fit to evaluate | Key suitability checks |
|---|---|---|
| Emergency reserve | Cash or cash-equivalent options | Safety, liquidity, access, inflation risk |
| Short-term goal | Low-volatility, liquid investments | Time horizon, principal risk, fees, tax |
| Long-term growth | Diversified equity exposure | Volatility tolerance, time horizon, rebalancing |
| Retirement income | Balanced portfolio, income strategy, annuity concepts | Longevity, inflation, tax, survivor needs |
| Tax efficiency | Registered account placement, TFSA, capital-gain-oriented holdings | Contribution room, withdrawal rules, liquidity |
| Estate transfer | Beneficiary designations, insurance, trusts, joint ownership considerations | Tax, control, legal risk, family conflict |
Return and Risk Formula Checks
Nominal return versus real return approximation:
\[ \text{Approximate real return} \approx \text{Nominal return} - \text{Inflation rate} \]More precise real return:
\[ \text{Real return} = \frac{1 + \text{Nominal return}}{1 + \text{Inflation rate}} - 1 \]After-tax return:
\[ \text{After-tax return} = \text{Pre-tax return} \times (1 - \text{Tax rate}) \]Use the tax rate and tax treatment specified in the question. Do not assume all returns are taxed identically.
Insurance and Risk Management Checklist
Personal Risk Areas
- Identify risks related to death, disability, illness, liability, property loss, longevity, and long-term care.
- Distinguish risk avoidance, reduction, retention, and transfer.
- Determine whether insurance is needed before choosing a product.
- Recognize the difference between temporary and permanent insurance needs.
- Compare term insurance and permanent insurance at a conceptual planning level.
- Identify the role of disability insurance in income protection.
- Identify the role of critical illness insurance in lump-sum health-related funding.
- Identify the role of long-term care planning for later-life support needs.
- Recognize when group benefits are insufficient or non-portable.
- Consider beneficiary designations, ownership, tax, estate liquidity, and creditor considerations where relevant.
Life Insurance Needs Analysis
Capital needs method:
\[ \text{Insurance need} = \text{Immediate cash needs} + \text{Capitalized income needs} + \text{Debt repayment} + \text{Education or other goals} - \text{Available resources} \]Be ready to adjust for:
- surviving spouse income,
- existing insurance,
- registered and non-registered assets,
- tax liabilities,
- final expenses,
- mortgage or other debts,
- dependant support period,
- inflation,
- and estate liquidity.
Insurance Scenario Cues
| Scenario cue | Planning response to consider |
|---|---|
| Young family with mortgage and one income earner | Life and disability coverage needs; emergency fund; beneficiary review |
| High-income professional with group disability only | Definition of disability, benefit limits, taxability, waiting period, portability |
| Business with key employee | Key-person insurance and buy-sell funding concepts |
| Estate with illiquid assets | Liquidity for tax, debts, equalization, or business transition |
| Client wants investment return from insurance | First confirm insurance need, suitability, cost, alternatives, and time horizon |
| Client nearing retirement | Review ongoing need, affordability, estate goals, health risk, long-term care exposure |
Estate Planning Checklist
Core Estate Readiness
- Explain the purpose of a will.
- Identify consequences of dying without valid estate planning documents.
- Distinguish executor, trustee, beneficiary, guardian, and attorney roles.
- Recognize the planning role of powers of attorney or similar incapacity documents.
- Review beneficiary designations on registered plans and insurance.
- Identify estate liquidity needs.
- Recognize possible tax consequences at death.
- Identify family conflict risks, blended-family issues, dependant support needs, and unequal asset distribution concerns.
- Understand when trusts may be considered for control, protection, tax, privacy, or special-needs planning.
- Recognize that legal drafting and legal validity require appropriate professional involvement.
Estate Decision Table
| Client goal or issue | Planning points to review |
|---|---|
| Provide for spouse | Will, beneficiary designations, joint ownership, pension survivor benefits, tax rollover concepts |
| Provide for minor children | Guardian, trust terms, trustee choice, insurance, education funding |
| Equalize children where one receives business or cottage | Insurance, buyout funding, tax, valuation, family communication |
| Reduce estate delays or costs | Beneficiary designations, joint ownership risks, trusts, probate concepts, liquidity |
| Support disabled beneficiary | Trust planning, benefit eligibility, trustee selection, professional advice |
| Charitable giving | Will bequest, beneficiary designation, tax credit logic, timing |
| Business succession | Shareholder agreement, buy-sell funding, valuation, tax, management continuity |
Common Estate Traps
- Assuming joint ownership is always the best estate strategy.
- Forgetting tax and family-law consequences of asset transfers.
- Ignoring beneficiary designations after divorce, remarriage, birth, or death.
- Recommending estate tactics without considering control during life.
- Treating probate reduction as more important than fairness, tax, or legal certainty.
- Forgetting liquidity for tax, debt, funeral expenses, and business transition.
Business-Owner Planning Checklist
Business-owner cases often integrate tax, insurance, retirement, estate, and investment planning.
Business Facts to Gather
- Legal structure: sole proprietorship, partnership, corporation, or professional corporation.
- Ownership percentages and shareholder relationships.
- Business value and valuation assumptions.
- Salary, dividends, retained earnings, and personal cash flow needs.
- Business debts, guarantees, leases, and key contracts.
- Key employees and operational dependence.
- Shareholder agreement and buy-sell terms.
- Insurance owned personally or corporately.
- Succession timeline and intended buyer.
- Retirement funding outside the business.
- Estate equalization needs.
Business Planning Readiness Table
| Topic | What to be ready for |
|---|---|
| Compensation | Compare salary, dividends, benefits, retirement contributions, and cash flow at a planning level |
| Succession | Identify sale, family transfer, management buyout, or wind-down considerations |
| Buy-sell planning | Understand death, disability, retirement, divorce, and dispute triggers |
| Insurance | Identify key-person, shareholder, debt, and estate liquidity uses |
| Tax | Recognize that corporate tax planning often requires specialist advice |
| Retirement | Avoid relying only on a future business sale as the retirement plan |
| Estate | Coordinate shares, voting control, liquidity, family fairness, and tax |
Education and Goal-Based Planning Checklist
- Identify the goal, beneficiary, time horizon, contribution source, and flexibility needs.
- Understand registered education savings plan concepts at a practical level.
- Recognize the difference between parent-owned savings, child-owned accounts, trusts, informal arrangements, and registered plans.
- Consider grants, tax treatment, control, contribution limits, and withdrawal purpose using current course materials.
- Match investment risk to the time remaining before funds are needed.
- Adjust plan recommendations if the beneficiary may not pursue eligible education.
- Integrate education planning with insurance and estate planning if parents or grandparents are funding the goal.
Family, Life-Event, and Special Situation Planning
Life Events to Recognize
| Life event | Planning areas to revisit |
|---|---|
| Marriage or common-law relationship | Budget, tax, insurance, beneficiaries, property ownership, estate documents |
| Separation or divorce | Cash flow, support obligations, beneficiaries, pension division, estate updates, tax |
| Birth or adoption | Insurance, education savings, guardianship, emergency fund, wills |
| Disability or illness | Income replacement, disability benefits, insurance claims, powers of attorney, spending |
| Job loss or career change | Cash flow, benefits, pension, severance, tax, emergency fund |
| Home purchase | Mortgage affordability, insurance, cash flow, registered plan withdrawal rules if applicable |
| Inheritance | Tax, debt repayment, investing, family expectations, estate planning |
| Retirement | Income sequencing, tax, health costs, estate, risk level |
| Death of spouse | Survivor benefits, estate settlement, tax, insurance, cash flow, emotional timing |
Suitability Prompts
Ask yourself:
- Does the recommendation still work if income falls?
- Does the client have enough liquidity?
- Is the time horizon long enough for the risk proposed?
- Does the recommendation create tax, legal, or family conflict?
- Is the client’s risk capacity lower than the stated risk tolerance?
- Is the product or strategy too complex for the client’s needs?
- Does the plan require a document, election, beneficiary update, or professional review?
Ethics, Compliance, and Professional Conduct
Ethical Judgment Checklist
- Put client interests at the centre of the recommendation.
- Identify actual, potential, and perceived conflicts of interest.
- Disclose relevant conflicts, compensation issues, risks, and limitations.
- Maintain confidentiality of client information.
- Avoid recommendations outside your competence or authority.
- Use accurate, fair, and balanced communication.
- Document facts, assumptions, analysis, recommendations, and client decisions.
- Avoid misleading projections or guarantees.
- Recognize vulnerable-client concerns and capacity issues.
- Recommend review when client circumstances change.
Compliance Scenario Cues
| Scenario cue | Best exam approach |
|---|---|
| Client wants advice based on incomplete facts | Gather missing information or limit the recommendation clearly |
| Client asks for aggressive tax avoidance | Identify risk, legality, documentation, and professional referral |
| Planner has a compensation conflict | Disclose conflict and ensure recommendation remains suitable |
| Client wants to name a planner as beneficiary or attorney | Recognize conflict and ethical risk |
| Client asks for guaranteed investment outcome | Avoid unsupported guarantees; explain risk and assumptions |
| Family member requests client information | Maintain confidentiality unless properly authorized |
| Client shows possible diminished capacity | Slow down, document, follow policy, involve authorized parties appropriately |
Integrated Case Readiness
FP II-style preparation should include integrated cases where several planning areas interact. Practise moving from facts to priorities.
Case Analysis Sequence
Use this sequence when reading a long scenario:
- Identify client profile: age, family, employment, health, dependants, residency.
- List goals: retirement, education, debt, estate, business, tax, insurance, lifestyle.
- Find constraints: cash flow, liquidity, risk tolerance, time horizon, tax bracket, legal documents.
- Spot risks: death, disability, market, longevity, liability, concentration, family conflict.
- Calculate where needed: net worth, cash flow, insurance need, retirement shortfall, tax impact.
- Prioritize: urgent protection and legal gaps before optimization.
- Recommend: choose actions that match the client’s facts.
- Document and review: state assumptions, implementation steps, and follow-up triggers.
Integrated Scenario Matrix
| If the case emphasizes… | Do not forget to check… |
|---|---|
| Retirement readiness | Insurance, survivor needs, tax, inflation, estate documents |
| Tax reduction | Suitability, liquidity, investment risk, compliance, documentation |
| Investment performance | Objectives, risk capacity, time horizon, account type, rebalancing |
| Estate transfer | Tax at death, beneficiary designations, liquidity, family fairness |
| Business succession | Shareholder agreement, insurance, tax, retirement diversification |
| Debt repayment | Emergency fund, opportunity cost, interest deductibility, insurance |
| Education funding | Parent retirement, insurance, time horizon, account flexibility |
| Elder planning | Capacity, powers of attorney, long-term care, fraud risk, family dynamics |
Calculation and Interpretation Checklist
You do not need to memorize unsupported numeric limits from this page. Use the current CSI course materials for current thresholds, limits, and tax details. For readiness, make sure you can apply the following calculation types when a question provides the inputs.
| Calculation type | You should be able to… | Interpretation check |
|---|---|---|
| Net worth | Assets minus liabilities | Is wealth liquid, diversified, and accessible? |
| Cash flow | Inflows minus outflows | Is there capacity to save, insure, or repay debt? |
| Savings gap | Required savings minus current savings | Is the goal realistic given time horizon and risk? |
| Future value | Grow a current amount by rate and time | Is the rate nominal, real, pre-tax, or after-tax? |
| Present value | Discount a future need to today | Is inflation already included? |
| Insurance need | Add needs and subtract available resources | Are survivor income and existing coverage included? |
| Debt ratio | Debt payments divided by income measure | Is the client’s income stable? |
| After-tax return | Adjust return for tax treatment | Which type of income is being taxed? |
| Capital gain | Proceeds minus adjusted cost base and costs | Are partial dispositions or reinvestments relevant? |
| Retirement income gap | Desired spending minus reliable income | How will the gap be funded and taxed? |
“Can You Do This?” Master Checklist
Before exam day, you should be able to complete these tasks without relying on long notes.
Client and Plan Construction
- Given a client case, list the top three planning priorities.
- Identify missing facts before selecting a strategy.
- Distinguish urgent protection needs from long-term optimization.
- Explain why a recommendation is suitable for this client, not just generally correct.
- Identify implementation steps and responsible parties.
- State when a plan should be reviewed.
Tax and Retirement
- Compare RRSP and TFSA suitability in a client scenario.
- Explain how marginal tax rate affects contribution and withdrawal decisions.
- Identify tax-efficient account placement considerations.
- Recognize capital gains, dividends, interest, and registered-account tax differences.
- Analyze retirement income sources and timing.
- Explain inflation and longevity risk in retirement planning.
- Identify survivor income issues after death of a spouse.
Investment Planning
- Match asset allocation to goal, horizon, risk tolerance, and risk capacity.
- Identify why a portfolio may be unsuitable even if returns are strong.
- Explain concentration risk and diversification.
- Interpret nominal, real, pre-tax, and after-tax return.
- Recommend rebalancing when portfolio drift changes risk.
- Recognize behavioural finance issues in client decisions.
Insurance and Estate
- Calculate a basic life insurance need from supplied data.
- Distinguish term and permanent insurance planning uses.
- Identify disability and critical illness planning gaps.
- Review beneficiary designations and estate liquidity.
- Identify when a trust, will update, or power of attorney may be relevant.
- Recognize family fairness issues in estate and business succession planning.
Ethics and Compliance
- Identify conflicts of interest.
- Choose a compliant response when facts are incomplete.
- Protect confidentiality in family or third-party requests.
- Avoid unsupported guarantees or misleading projections.
- Know when to refer to a qualified professional.
- Document client instructions and assumptions.
Common Weak Areas and Exam Traps
| Weak area | Why it causes errors | How to correct it |
|---|---|---|
| Jumping to a product | The exam often tests process and suitability before product choice | Start with facts, goal, risk, tax, and constraints |
| Ignoring missing information | A recommendation may be premature | Ask what must be known before advice |
| Confusing risk tolerance and risk capacity | Clients may emotionally accept risk they cannot financially bear | Evaluate both separately |
| Treating tax as the only goal | Low tax can still mean poor liquidity, high risk, or poor fit | Balance tax with suitability |
| Overlooking insurance before investing | A family may be exposed to catastrophic loss | Check death, disability, illness, liability, and property risk |
| Forgetting estate documents | Good accumulation planning can fail at incapacity or death | Check wills, powers of attorney, beneficiaries, executors |
| Misreading account ownership | Ownership affects tax, control, estate, and creditor issues | Track owner, annuitant, beneficiary, and contributor roles |
| Ignoring time horizon by goal | One client can have multiple horizons | Match each asset pool to a specific goal |
| Using pre-tax numbers in after-tax decisions | Retirement and investment choices depend on spendable cash | Convert to after-tax where required |
| Assuming equal treatment across provinces or documents | Legal and estate details may vary | Use course context and refer when legal advice is needed |
| Neglecting business-owner concentration | Business value may dominate net worth | Diversify, insure, and plan succession |
| Forgetting review triggers | A plan is not static | Link reviews to life events, tax changes, markets, and goals |
Final-Week FP II Review Checklist
Seven to Five Days Out
- Re-read your weakest financial planning areas, not the entire course passively.
- Complete mixed-topic practice cases.
- Build a one-page formula and interpretation sheet.
- Review tax classification: interest, dividends, capital gains, registered withdrawals, deductions, credits.
- Review insurance needs analysis and estate liquidity scenarios.
- Practise identifying the best next action when facts are incomplete.
Four to Two Days Out
- Drill integrated scenarios under timed conditions.
- Review every missed question by cause:
- Knowledge gap.
- Misread fact.
- Calculation error.
- Suitability error.
- Ethics or compliance error.
- Redo questions missed for judgment reasons.
- Review client-document vocabulary: will, power of attorney, beneficiary, executor, trustee, shareholder agreement.
- Confirm current course rules, limits, and definitions from your CSI materials.
Day Before
- Stop trying to learn large new topics.
- Review your formula sheet and common traps.
- Practise a short case analysis sequence.
- Prepare exam logistics and permitted materials according to current instructions.
- Sleep and avoid last-minute overloading.
Exam-Day Mindset
- Read the client facts before choosing the strategy.
- Watch for words such as “most appropriate,” “first,” “best next step,” and “least suitable.”
- If two answers seem correct, choose the one that best fits the client’s facts and planning process.
- Do not ignore ethics, disclosure, documentation, or referral issues.
- Check whether the question asks for calculation, interpretation, or recommendation.
- Use elimination when an answer is technically true but unsuitable for the client.
Practical Next Step
Use this checklist to mark each area as strong, uncertain, or needs work. Then focus practice on integrated FP II scenarios that combine tax, retirement, investment, insurance, estate, and ethics decisions. The goal is not only to remember concepts, but to choose the most suitable action for the client facts presented.