My spouse and I have different RRSP accounts and an RPP and it seems to me that the timing of the conversion or each to a RRIF or LIF would have a significant impact both in terms of mandated withdrawal rates but also to obtain the benefits of income splitting. To that end, I am trying out different scenarios but it is painful.

Fro what I can see, the only place to enter this information is in the Accounts section and this requires opening each account, hitting Edit, and then clicking to get to the 2nd page to update the RRIF year for each scenario. I don't see any way to view these changes in a single view and there is no indication of this RRIF conversion timing in any of the Time Machine reports.

Am I missing something? Also, does the Optimizer look at optimizing RRIF conversion timing?

The easiest way to vary the conversion age over multiple values to gauge its impact, would be to set up a SCAN. Under Setup new SCAN, select the ACCOUNTS table, and then the Age of conversion will appear as parameter for each applicable account you have. This way, you can consider a range of ages all in one go. You can add additional parameters to the scan to vary simultaneously on multiple accounts.

The only thing conversion does is to force a minimum withdrawal every year after conversion. This does not mean you can't make withdrawals from (not locked-in) accounts before conversion. Often people don't convert until they have to (age 71) for maximimum flexibility. The Withdrawal Optimizer does honour the minimum withdrawals, but it also optimizes for withdrawals irrespective of the conversion status, so it may start withdrawing earlier from those accounts. You can have the SCANS run with the Withdrawal Optimizer.

You make a good point that the age of conversion is not currently shown in the reports. I think it could be useful in the detailed reports to seperate out the mandated minimum withdrawals from other withdrawals that were made, I'll add that.

I know the second page issue is a little awkward, but the system needs to know what type of account it is to know what questions it needs to ask next, and the type of account can be modified on the first page (so you can convert your RRSP to RRIF when that time comes yourself). I'll see if there's any way to make it easier.
Thanks.

Got it.. thanks