Whisky,
Having been in the insurance game for over 14 years, both as an independent agent and a carrier exec, I have seen it from all sides.
I agree that in most cases, a broker representing your case is valuable. That's why you pay a commission. The agent, as opposed to a broker, represents his policyholders, not the insurance carriers. As broker, on the other hand, represents carriers, not policyholders.
The third distributive arrangement is e-commerce. A hybrid would be, like Continental did several years ago and Progressive, which does it now, is to sign up the client over the net and then "assign" the new client" a local agent of his choosing. The policyholder gets the discounted program and a agent to represent him.
Now with banks in the game ( called "bancassurance" ) they'll use in-house agents.
E-commerce in health care issues is the future. However, there will always be a significant share of the marketplace that places a higher value on real-people transactions and will pay for the privilege to conduct business that way.
(puff, puff)
CigarHolder |
