The July 2002 disk update will be processed Monday, June 24th and Tuesday, June 25th. Disks will be shipped Wednesday, June 26th. You should have the July Update in your office by Friday, June 28th.
The July 2002 Internet monthly update will be posted to our five monthly update websites on Tuesday, June 25th.
Unless you have made arrangements to purchase your diskettes, please return your "May disks" ONLY AFTER you have successfully installed this June 2002 Update. May disks are your backup in case you should have problems installing the June edition.
This section of the bulletin is for less than half of our subscribers. That's right, the majority of Compulife's subscribers now obtain their monthly updates by Internet.
With the new Internet updating feature built into our software, technical support calls requesting assistance in processing Internet updates have fallen dramatically.
To sum it up, Internet updates are easier, faster and cheaper.
For those of you who still obtain disks each month, and who don't wish to switch over to getting updates by Internet, there are two ways to eliminate the problem of having to return disks. Please go to the end of this bulletin for full details.
Compulife is simplifying the way that we issue "thank you" credits to our software subscribers.
If you call Compulife to report a rate error, program bug, or help Compulife obtain new rates, etc., we have traditionally given a free month of software as our way to say thanks. That practice will not change but we are changing the way that the credit is given.
At one time most subscribers received disks each month and most paid monthly. That's no longer the case. All subscribers now pay annually. And because most subscribers get updates by Internet, where the expiration date has been fixed into the Internet Master Disk that you install once every year (or two) to your computer, we needed to come up with a more efficient way to give credits to those who qualify.
Those qualifying for credits will now be sent a "Compulife Credit Voucher" indicating either the "amount" or "percentage" discount that you have been awarded. When you receive your next invoice for a subscription renewal from Compulife, you can apply that credit voucher or vouchers (you could have more than one), together with the balance of payment for that invoice, as the total payment for that invoice.
The following are examples of credits awarded:
Those who report a rate error, or alert us to new rates, will be given a "Compulife Credit Voucher" for 10% of the annual subscription price.
If you refer a new agency customer to Compulife, you will receive a credit voucher for 50% of the price of the Internet version of the agency system. Currently an agency system is $299. Therefore, you would receive a credit voucher for $150. Alternately, you could waive your right to that credit, and the credit can be taken by the agency that you referred. This means that they could buy the software for $149 instead of $299. Once again, you forfeit your right to a credit voucher if this happens.
If you refer a new personal use customer to Compulife, you will receive a credit voucher for 50% of the price of the Internet version of the personal use system. Currently a personal use system is $199. Therefore, you would receive a credit voucher for $100. Alternately, you could waive your right to that credit, and the credit can be taken by the agent that you referred meaning that he or she could buy the software for $99 instead of $199. Once again, you forfeit your right to a credit voucher if this happens.
If you refer a new "Term4Sale - Agent Edition" customer to Compulife, you will receive a credit voucher for $30. You may not waive the credit voucher or give the credit to another agent.
Credit vouchers CANNOT be used as payment toward the cost of a "Term4Sale - Agent Edition" program.
Credit vouchers are not given to anyone who has purchased the "Term4Sale - Agent Edition" of our software. The annual cost of this subscription is already very low. Please remember that there are a number of options and benefits not available to Term4Sale - Agent Edition subscribers.
Compulife has now released our new "Term4Sale - Agent Edition". This new software product is focused on being the lowest cost term comparison software available for agents.
In keeping with this low cost, there are several differences between the "Term4Sale - Agent Edition" and the full "Compulife Quotation System". For full details go to:
There are also references and links to this webpage at our Term4Sale website. We are now making a more strongly worded recommendation that consumers find an agent who uses the Compulife program. You might want to check that out.
At the same time that Compulife has introduced our new Term4Sale Agent Edition, we have also amended the pricing structure.
Two year subscription pricing for those receiving disk updates has been eliminated.
A three year subscription price, for those obtaining Internet Updates, has now been introduced. Agents or agencies can save $99 per year for each additional year that they purchase when renewing a one year subscription. For example, a personal use subscription to Compulife is $199, but a second year can be added by paying an additional $100 for a total price of $299. A third year can be added by paying an additional $100 for a total price of $399 for 3 years.
The strategy behind these pricing changes is quite simple. Those who obtain their monthly updates by disk represent the most work and expense for Compulife. By contrast, we do not have to ship or handle the disk returns for Internet subscribers.
Further, each year, when we invoice for subscription renewals, and process subscription payments, there is substantial administrative work that is entailed. We must invoice you. Frequently our customers move and do not advise us. We must track them down. When we receive your payment we must process it. Next we issue you an Internet Master Disk authorizing you to obtain updates for another year. Taken together, it's a lot of work.
Alternately, when you purchase a two year (or now three year) subscription, we eliminate all that work in the second or third year. That saves us money, and enhances our customer retention (there are no subscription refunds for early cancellation). As a result, we can afford to offer very deep discounts for 2nd and 3rd year subscriptions.
Compulife has now added several links to the "Help" option at the top of the Red Master Menu. Clicking on those links will activate your browser and connect to Compulife's webpages where we provide more information about Compulife and our comparison programs.
We have also added links from our "Company Information" window to the life company's website.
The Company information function provides the name, mailing address, phone number and contact people for the company's home office (where we have that information). We have now added the website and the e-mail address for general inquiries. While we have worked very hard and located the home webpages for virtually all life companies, we have not entered a number of the e-mail addresses. We would ask that life companies advise us as to which address they would like us to give out to subscribers wanting to make initial inquiries of life companies.
In the DOS version of the program, the links and addresses are displayed but you cannot launch the browser from the DOS software.
In the Windows version of the program, a button appears at the bottom of the "Company Information" window, and the button when clicked will activate your Internet browser and take you to the life company's website.
We have now completed the modification to the "Category" button which is found on a single product window/display. Not only will the "Category" button display all the available premium categories for that product, and the company category names if they are different from those used by Compulife, it now displays the premium for each company category.
There are two ways to display a single product window. First, it will appear when you press the F2 button (Display a Single Product). Second, it is the window that appears when you double left click on a product from within a comparison.
With the single product window displayed, you will see in the top right hand part of the header a "Category" button. Clicking this will display a list of premium categories for the product. The name that the company uses to describe the category is displayed together with Compulife's short form classification. Compulife's short forms, and their meanings, are as follows:
P+Ns - Preferred Plus Non-Smoker P+SM - Preferred Plus Smoker
PfNs - Preferred Non-Smoker
R+Ns - Regular Plus Non-Smoker
RgNs - Regular Non-Smoker
PfSM - Preferred Smoker
R+SM - Regular Plus Smoker
RgSM - Regular Smoker
The new feature adds the premium to the right of the company category description. Categories are sorted by premium in their respective non- smoking and smoking groups.
This does two things for the user:
1. If you are trying to match a premium to one given to you by a consumer or another agent, you can quickly see which category that premium is for.
2. Categories are sorted by premium. Previously, for companies with multiple P+ categories, there were occasions where a lower priced category might follow a higher priced category on the list. That proved a little confusing and had to do with the order categories appeared in product entries. This is now fixed.
During June we will be converting a number of products to take advantage of some new variables and switches that we have now incorporated into the program. We can now record the maximum face amount for waiver, and track states where waiver of premium is not available.
There are a number of product duplications, or waiver premium band duplications, which we will be able to eliminate. This will make our database smaller, faster and simpler. We will be introducing the new data changes all through June once we are satisfied that the new Windows program is working well for all customers.
The above mentioned states are increasingly placing limits on the maximum issue ages for products sold in their state. WA is the most aggressive in this respect.
To accommodate this, we have been placing products in our system more than once. This is to ensure that for the affected state, we are not quoting for issue ages above that state's maximum.
Our database can now track different maximum issue ages for states. During July we will converting over products to eliminate the redundant state entries that can be eliminated with this new feature. As in the case of Waiver of premium, this will save space in our data files, make our program faster and simpler to use.
We will not be touching this until July as we want to give some additional warning to those who use the Compulife Internet software. The internet engine software NEEDS TO BE UPDATED or the new files will quote incorrectly in the affected states.
If you have not received and updated Internet comparison engine since May 1st, you need to e-mail Compulife at barneyrl@compulife.com.
Once again, as those running our Windows program noticed in March and April, the new Windows program now automatically and periodically checks to see if there are newer mid-month updates available on the Internet. It compares the date posted on the website, with the date of your last download, and if the website has a newer date the program will advise you and ask if you want to download the update.
IMPORTANT: Midmonth updates can occur ANYTIME between monthly updates. These are placed on our website as changes occur, when they occur.
MIDMONTH.TXT can be viewed using the View/Print File option on the Red Master menu.
For those who still wish to review the changes before downloading, you can still manually download the mid-month update.
UPDATE1.CMP is a very, very small update file which now contains the MIDMONTH.TXT file. By manually downloading UPDATE1.CMP (that will download almost instantly) and then by running and processing that file with the Compulife program (that will process instantly), you can review the MIDMONTH.TXT file using the View/Print File option on the Master menu. If you want the changes, you can then download the rest of the UPDATE files manually or automatically.
a) Pick 12 will be modified to allow the filing of multiple life quotes reflecting discounts for companies which offer multi-life options. You will be able to print pages showing total premiums for all lives and then subsequent pages for each individual life. Discounts, where available, will be noted. As the Pick 12 features become available, they will be posted to our mid-month update site.
b) Pick 12 will allow the quotation of modal premiums together with waiver of premium. Currently, when you click on waiver of premium, the spreadsheet defaults to annual premium. If you switch to another premium mode, the waiver of premium is dropped.
For those who update by Internet, Compulife has gone to great lengths to provide you with redundancy in our websites. Our main website is:
However, we keep another completely separate website, on a completely different server, in a completely different country, at:
Whatever we update to compulife.com, we also update to compulife.cc. If one website goes down, for whatever reason, the other is ready to serve you. That includes both monthly and mid-month updates.
For those doing monthly updates by Internet, we have three other websites standing at ready with the monthly updates. If you cannot obtain your monthly update from either compulife.com or compulife.cc, call our office at (800) 567-8376 and we'll tell you where the third site is.
For those not wanting to return disks there are two ways to eliminate the problem.
1. Switch to obtaining monthly updates by Internet.
Not only will you eliminate the expense and hassle of returning disks, you will save $80 per year in subscription fees.
To switch to Internet monthly updates, call us at (800) 798-3488. We will send you an agreement called the "Internet Update Endorsement". Alternately, the agreement is now available at our www.compulife.com website under "Forms, applications, instruction tutorials, etc."
Once you have it, please read it carefully, especially the part where you agree that you have successfully downloaded and processed our "mid- month updates". If you haven't done that before, call us and we'll be happy to take you through the procedure. It's easy.
2. Disk Purchase Program
The other way to avoid returning the disks and the disk box each month is to pre-purchase them for $21 per year ($1.75 per month). Once you do that you can keep them for future reference, throw them away or return them for a credit (once each year) when you are invoiced for the following year. $21 costs you less than mailing back disks each month.