Working in the financial industry showed Gerard Arsenault and Brian Jones that too often, people would be left with a legal and financial mess when their loved ones passed away, simply because the paperwork wasn't in order.

That gave them the idea to start up Essential Life Data, which recently launched its personal documentation tool.

ELD's website provides users with an online tool they can use to log their crucial information throughout their lifetime, with full access to the information given to executors and powers-of-attorney in the event of the user's death or incapacitation.

"It's a tool to help people organize the details of life that we normally have in files, binders, or might not care to keep at all," says Mr. Arsenault, ELD's chief executive. "Individuals can use it in their lifetime to organize their affairs."

Subscribers can use the site to easily and comprehensively log personal, legal and financial information, as well as data about their service providers for insurance, health care and so on, and their personal preferences for issues such as long-term care, funeral arrangements and interment – and even information about what they want done about their pets in the event of their death.

As well, it can be a tool to help financial advisers better assess what sort of recommendations they should make to their clients.

And because the tool is web-based, subscribers and their financial advisers, executors, or powers-of-attorney can easily access the information in one location, instead of having to hunt for documents in various locations.

"One of the things we realized is that when a user has to deal with anything financial, they need to have a filing cabinet on wheels to bring to a meeting with a financial adviser or accountant, and a lot of times that's not possible," says Mr. Jones, who is the company's chief financial officer as well as a practising chartered accountant. "Instead of people taking a list of things to try and remember to bring along, they can now get ahold of that information anywhere there's Internet access."

Mr. Arsenault says he first thought of a comprehensive lifetime questionnaire when his father was diagnosed with cancer seven years ago, and needed help putting together the pieces of his estate while he was still living.

"I decided to put together a framework for a paper-based, living document, which ultimately become the web-based product you see today," Mr. Arsenault says. "The online product gave us an opportunity to add features and make it more relevant in today's electronic world."

He teamed up with Mr. Jones, who like Mr. Arsenault, is based in Timmins and still has a practice there, and the two began the final development phase of ELD in the fall of 2005.

However, the two decided to have ELD's headquarters in Ottawa because the team of experts whose help they employed to put together the exhaustive list of questions in the tool was largely made up of people from this city.

With the software now fully developed, Mr. Arsenault and Mr. Jones are looking to target three markets: firstly, people who stumble across the site and decide to subscribe directly; secondly, financial advisers who would use the web-based tool with their clients and use it to gather all relevant data to assist with ongoing financial needs as well as to help executors at the time of death or incapacitation of clients; and thirdly, financial institutions, especially trust companies and institutional trustees.

The responses from financial advisers who were invited to test the product prior to its launch was positive, say Mr. Arsenault and Mr. Jones, with 30 per cent of testers providing feedback and a greater percentage agreeing to use the software.

"No one else has put together such an extensive program from gathering and storing information which is web-based," says Mr. Arsenault. Any competing products they have found have been paper-based, or on CD, with the accessibility issues that come with those media.

Stringent security features are an added benefit of the product, as the information that is entered into the tool is time-stamped, IP address-stamped, stored securely, backed up regularly, and each account is stored separately in a separate database. As well, information is encrypted twice: during transmission and when stored.

"We engaged a firm to do a security audit ... and our online payment processor also put us through the ropes," says Mr. Jones. "We realize computer security is the key to success, and we continue to monitor the information on a regular a basis."

With the product now having been launched, the next step is to hit the road to promote it, and the company is holding a seminar in Ottawa in May with financial advisers to gauge their response and interest, as well as in the United States later on.

"Once (subscribers) get into ELD, it's one-stop shopping, and it allows them to think through things they have to organize," says Mr. Jones. "It really streamlines the job of executors and alleviates the stress and anxiety at what is usually an inopportune time."