Finding a Ga in My Area

[chastain77]

I'm new to the industry and I am wanting to start out indy but not knowing the product very well im afraid that would be suicide. Ive read a lot of posts saying find an independant ga in your area that will be willing to personally mentor you. My question is how do I go about finding one?

 

[Crabcake Johnny]

What are you planning on selling?

 

[chastain77]

im leaning towards health and life based on the research ive done so far but still undecided.

 

[insuranceexec]

Where in MO are you located? I know a good GA in the St. Louis area.

 

[chastain77]

I'm located in Springfield, MO

 

[armydad]

I used to live in Springfield. My son still lives there. My wife has family there too. Really nice place to live.

I didn't have my lic. than. There has to be a good GA down there, Springfield keeps growing. You might want to ask your car insurance agent if they know anybody. Good luck!

 

[Frank Stastny]

I'm new to the industry and I am wanting to start out indy but not knowing the product very well im afraid that would be suicide. Ive read a lot of posts saying find an independant ga in your area that will be willing to personally mentor you. My question is how do I go about finding one?

Be very careful in selecting one.

Especially if the GA asks you to sign a contract. There are a lot of pitfalls that can be very dangerous for a new agent who isn't familiar how the whole system works.

I'm not saying all GA's will do these things but below are listed some of the more common ones that new agents should be aware of.

1. If you are asked to sign a contract look it over very carefully. Anything you don't understand or are not sure of start a thread and ask for help. There isn't anything that at least one agent on this board will not be aware of.

Pay special attention to the wording regarding the companies you will be selling for. GA's are notorious for locking an agent into the companies the GA represents and then not giving the agent a release if the agent decides to leave the GA. This means you cannot sell for those companies for as long as possibly a year.

2. Some GA's will offer what seems like an awesome commission that is above "street level". Sometimes they fail to tell the agent that it is first year commission only and that subsequent years will be substantially lower than "street level".

3. Know who will be the "agent of record" for all applications you write. If it is the GA, that will raise a lot of additional questions. If the GA is the agent of record then all commission checks come to him and he pays you what he wants to. If you leave the GA, you leave all future commissions behind you and you walk out without a penny.

4. If "leads" are promised ask for specific information about the "leads". If they are all "direct mail" there is a good chance that they have been worked several times. (In my opinion there are no "hot" direct mail leads.) Ask if you have to pay for them either by buying them or taking less in commission be careful. (The "leads" I was given consisted of a voter registration list.)

5. Some offer "training". The "training" in most cases is pretty crappy even if it does exist. Ask ahead of time for an outline explaining exactly what training will consist of and how long it will last. (My training was listening to the manager tell me how "big and powerful" he was for over two hours.)

6. Ask about production requirements. One agent I know is doing extremely selling health insurance but faces termination if he continues to fail to sell enough of the crappy life policy he has to sell. (Most likely the GA is getting around 115% commission or higher and pobably paying the agent around 90% or lower.)

7. Some GA's will require the agent to pay "rent" for their desk and a monthly telephone fee. If he mentions this run like hell.

In case you can't tell I am not a huge fan of GA's period. Most are only interested in making money from unsuspecting agents. When the agent finds out and leaves there are a whole bunch more that are "waiting in line" who will fall for their crap.

In the mean time, the GA is still getting the commision checks for the business the former agents wrote. Most I have run into sleep very well at night.

And, I am "holding back".

 

[chastain77]

Thank you for taking the time to explain that. I will definately be on the look out for those things if i find someone.

 

[Frank Stastny]

Thank you for taking the time to explain that. I will definately be on the look out for those things if i find someone.

What do you plan to sell?

Springfield is where I started selling insurance. Lots of fond memories down there.

 

[chastain77]

thats a good question . Im leaning towards h&l but haven't ruled out p&c either. did you start out captive or indy?