If you're a broker or fiduciary who has been managing your contract portfolio for years in Excel spreadsheets or in physical and digital folders, you know the pattern: at first, it works well. But with every new client, every new policy, and every additional employee, keeping track becomes harder. At the latest when a client calls unexpectedly wanting to know when their contract can be cancelled, or when two employees are working on the same file at the same time, the limits of a spreadsheet become obvious.
Why Excel lists and folders reach their limits
A single Excel spreadsheet may be enough for a few dozen clients. But once the portfolio grows and several people in the office work with it, typical problems appear:
- Version chaos: Files are named "Contract_final", "Contract_final_new" or "Contract_2026_corrected" – which version is actually valid can often only be clarified by asking around.
- Premiums without an overview: Anyone wanting to know how much total premium volume a client has across which lines of business usually has to add up several rows by hand.
- Tedious searching: Finding a specific policy in a folder with hundreds of subfolders costs time that's then missing from client contact.
- No traceability: Whoever overwrites a row in Excel simply overwrites it – with no log of who changed what, and when.
- Disconnected from client contact: Notes from phone calls, appointments and tasks live in emails or on paper, while policies sit in a separate file. The connection gets lost.
What proper contract management needs to deliver
For the contract portfolio to stay manageable as the client base grows, more than a list is needed. Practical experience from brokerage and fiduciary offices points to a few requirements:
- The entire portfolio of a client must be visible at a glance – not scattered across several files or folders.
- Contracts should be categorised by line of business, so that portfolio and premiums can be evaluated per line.
- Changes to a contract must not simply overwrite the previous version, but must remain traceable as a version.
- Premiums must be visible per contract and per client, without manual adding up.
- The contract portfolio should be linked to the client history – notes, tasks and appointments belong to the same client context.
Contract management is only truly clean once it's traceable at any time who changed which contract, and when – without anyone in the office having to be asked.
How finra organises your contract portfolio
finra manages your contract and policy portfolio directly per client. All of a client's contracts are visible in one place, categorised according to a Swiss catalogue of insurance lines – from liability to household contents to health and vehicle insurance. The premium can be recorded for each contract, so that both the individual contract and the client's entire portfolio stay in view at all times.
Changes to a contract are not overwritten but recorded as a version history. This keeps it traceable which version was valid at which point in time – even when several employees are working on the same client portfolio.
The contract portfolio isn't isolated: through the integrated contacts and CRM module, notes, tasks, appointments and a client's entire timeline are linked to their contracts. Anyone opening a policy therefore also sees the conversation history and open tasks for that same client – without switching between different systems or files.
Cancellation dates, main renewal dates and file deadlines also come together in the deadline radar: a table that sorts all upcoming dates and tasks by urgency. That way, no cancellation deadline gets lost in an Excel row that nobody opens anymore.
From Excel chaos to a client portal: how the switch works
Switching doesn't have to be a major undertaking. In practice, it works well to keep the existing Excel list as an archive and gradually record new and currently active contracts, client by client, in the new system – for example at the next client contact. That way, the digital portfolio grows organically, without needing to migrate everything at once.
Because finra runs in the browser, no installation is required – your employees simply work via your office's own familiar subdomain. And because several people can access the same client portfolio at the same time without overwriting each other's files, the classic "who saved last" problem disappears. Since this involves sensitive insurance and personal data, it's also important to note: the data is hosted exclusively in Switzerland, encrypted, and stored with strict separation between clients – compliant with the Swiss Data Protection Act (revDSG).
If you'd like to get your contract portfolio out of Excel chaos and manage policies, premiums and client contact in one place, it's worth taking a look at finra's features or directly at the pricing. finra can be tried free for 30 days without a credit card – so you can test with your own portfolio whether switching is worthwhile for your office. Try it free now.