Newsletter Q4 2024

On behalf of ADAPT, I’d like to thank you for your support this past year as we continue to focus on improving our solutions and building out our capabilities to better meet the needs of estate planning professionals. ADAPT has been working on several fronts to improve the overall solution both in terms of the documents the system produces as well as more robust functionality that is designed to support greater user control of the content, look and feel of the output.   While much of what is going on behind the scenes reflects longer-term product improvement efforts, we also are committed to continuing to respond to customer requests for additional functionality as well as addressing various formatting issues we are steadily improving.   It’s through your feedback that we not only are better able to serve you but also able to make our product better for all users.  So, we thank you for sharing those areas where you may be encountering difficulties as it helps us focus our efforts to improve.

2024 marked ADAPT’s comprehensive review and updating of all our state specific attestation templates.   It was also an important year for us to focus improving the format of our documents – with multiple releases devoted to addressing footer, pagination as well as a variety of other format related issues.

Equally important was our expansion of our “My Templates” functionality to include all of our correspondence templates.   In addition to providing our customers with more options in how they generate correspondence through ADAPT, this is also important foundational work in helping us build a better system down the road that will eventually allow users to be able to edit and append their own clauses to our various legal documents.

In the year ahead, ADAPT will be introducing a greater range of options in our will and revocable trust templates (particularly in our distribution section) so that users will be better able to cover a wider range of scenarios than they have historically.  You’ll also see increasing uniformity across the various interviews so that you will begin to see a more consistent and predictable user experience.

In addition to the various document update releases and formatting improvements, we also expect to have several brand-new templates to be announced later in 2025.

Again, thank you for your commitment to our product and best wishes for the New Year!

Tommy Cimino, CIO

Things to think about when helping a client select a name for their Trust

-Mark Hevrdejs JD, LL.M and COO of ADA Platform Technology, LLC

Every once in awhile a client will want to use an unusual name for their living trust.   While there is no legal reason preventing you from using an unusual name for your client’s trust, you may want to share a few practical considerations with your clients.  Otherwise, they may later regret naming it something like “The Aardvark Banana Cargo Revocable Living Trust” and later finding out what it really means to live with it.

Here’s a few guiding principles that can help make your client’s trust name easy to live with –

 Best to Keep it Short and Sweet!   A shorter name will make it easier for all parties to remember as well as less likely to be subject to errors when referencing in other legal documents and communications.   It also has the added benefit of being quicker to write/type out when referring to the trust on various forms and documents.

 Use Properly Spelled Legal Names When Practical.  In dealing with various third parties, it is usually easiest if the trust refers to the legal name of the settlors as this helps minimize any confusion especially when the settlors and the trustees are one in the same.

Be Careful to Avoid Confusion When Privacy is a Factor.  It may not be always appropriate to use Legal Names where privacy is a potential issue; you may need to select a different name to help guard your client’s identity.   If you do find you need to avoid the settlor’s name in naming the trust, you still will want to be careful in selecting names that can be mistaken for other entities or individuals generally known to the public-at-large or in your immediate area.   Always try to avoid using a similar name to known businesses or entities that third parties may be more familiar with to minimize mix-ups.

 Avoid Certain Words in the Title.  You never know what the future holds and when you may need to subsequently amend a trust.   Should you have material changes and wish to restate a trust at a later date (in order to avoid creating a new one and having to deal with funding), using certain legal terms initially may cause issues down the line.   For example, if you wish to restate a revocable trust and later make it irrevocable, it becomes awkward if you had originally called the trust “The John Smith Revocable Living Trust” as the restated name needs to refer to the name of the original trust.

For that reason, you should always avoid using words like “revocable” or “grantor trust” that have specific legal, or tax meaning tied to an aspect of the trust that may be changed in the future.

 Keeping these basic guiding principles in mind will ensure that your client will not have to deal with any hiccups in funding or working with 3^rd parties in the future.

ADAPT customer support team is available for assisting with any questions and concerns that come up with the system and documents.  ADAPT has a resource center that is located in the upper right hand corner of the solution.  The resource center can be accessed by clicking on the Book Icon and from the drop down menu users can access FAQ/Tutorial Videos and other articles and documents.  Please reach out with any questions that may arise.

(800) 212-2642 Opt. 1
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Support@adaptdocs.com

Chat with a team member online @ adaptdocs.com

What does a browser do?

The first and foremost thing a browser does is read the code that was used to develop web pages within a website using its Rendering Engine. And this is where the differences in browsers begin.

The rendering engine is how a web page is drawn. It reads the code to display every aspect of that web page which can be more difficult as there are many different coding languages used to create web pages. A browser needs to interpret those different languages to display any given web page correctly.

So, why should I use one browser over another?

Browsers are developed by different companies trying to either grab market share or simply provide functions that others do not. Because there are many browsers out there and so many different features, they lose focus on what’s most important about what a browser does.

Without a browser, computers would display websites as simple text, without graphics, font styles, colors, animation, and all the things we’ve become accustomed to while surfing the web.

Why don’t all browsers display a web page the same?

That is the question of all questions. Each browser’s rendering engine interprets code in a different way thus displaying web pages differently interpreting security incorrectly making the users experience inconsistent.

Which browser is best?

For many years Microsoft, Apple, and Google have fought for browser market share forgetting the important thing about browsing; creating a rendering engine that uses standardized methods, so all browsers render the same. Because Microsoft and Apple lost sight of this, Google built Chrome that by design would standardize the industry. Since then, many companies like Mozilla (Firefox) and Opera have adopted the same rendering engine Google uses thus further strengthening industry standards.

Currently, Google enjoys a 77% market share with Microsoft at less than 6% and Apple at less than 9%.

Because Chrome is widely used, and has become the standard, and Microsoft Edge and Apple’s Safari are not using standardized rendering engines, ADAPT recommends the Chrome browser as a first choice. Firefox and Opera are also acceptable.

What has ADAPT done to ensure its software code is standardized?

Google has produced many documents on how their engine works so that developers can use best practices not only for rendering the style of a website but its security.

ADAPT has adopted these standards to ensure our customers’ experience is the very best, especially when assembled documents are downloaded from the cloud.