If a Prospective Client is Insulting

I have a prospective new client that is a carrier referral, that has been obnoxious, obtuse and claimed that she had trouble understanding my Southern accent, claimed that she was joking, then made the same statement two more times while we were talking.

I've never had this happen before, and frankly, I have a lot of Northern clients, that have never made this claim, and have been a great source of referrals. In fact, most of my business is referrals.

I would like to tell her to find someone else, but this is a carrier referral. If I let on that I am not interested in her business, she is going straight back to them, I just know it.

How would you handle it?

Thanks
 
my opinion: Only you can decide if it's worth it or not. She may go back to the carrier, or you can just refer her to someone else that is a Northerner. If it's a good quality and likely sale, I would suck it up and grin through it. If she's buying a $20 term, I would just tell her that I couldn't help her leave it at that. End of the day, it's just up to how much you want the sale.
 
Sometimes people are just obnoxious because they have a set of hoops they enjoy putting people through. Perhaps this is the case.

What I would do is transition the conversation into something legal (drama, lawsuit, whatever), if she's a lawsuit -happy individual then you already know the answer. IMHO.
 
Ms. Jones... I can understand that you are having trouble understanding my southern accent, I'm also having a little difficulty understanding your accent. We'll just have to work thru this together (said with a smile).

If she's just a yankee b-itch.....Ms. Jones we can't help everybody, hope you have a good day. Hang up. You don't need to be her whipping boy.
 
Ms. Jones... I can understand that you are having trouble understanding my southern accent, I'm also having a little difficulty understanding your accent. We'll just have to work thru this together (said with a smile).

If she's just a yankee b-itch.....Ms. Jones we can't help everybody, hope you have a good day. Hang up. You don't need to be her whipping boy.

Love it. Thanks.
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Some random internet lead? Dump her. But a referral? You have to suck it up.

You got it. This carrier sends me a lot of referrals, and the last thing that I need is for her to tell them I refused to be her whipping boy.
 
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true recent story, a fellow agent, just received his 7th referral from a client, who another agent did not wish to deal with.

The best revenge is success.

Write the biz, and spend the commish on something you enjoy.
 
Another personal story.

Had a guy come to a seminar. He was a total jerk, made us jump through hoops to put $4,500 into an annuity in his IRA which translated to us making about minimum wage on the deal. And then he canceled during his free look period causing me a chargeback.

This was one of the most obnoxious people I have ever seen and the other agent with me swore that he came a hair close to jumping across the table and choking the guy to death.

A few months later the guy referred a friend to me that has done $500k in annuity business.

Moral: apparently the guy did not dislike us as much as we disliked him.
 
Another personal story.

Had a guy come to a seminar. He was a total jerk, made us jump through hoops to put $4,500 into an annuity in his IRA which translated to us making about minimum wage on the deal. And then he canceled during his free look period causing me a chargeback.

This was one of the most obnoxious people I have ever seen and the other agent with me swore that he came a hair close to jumping across the table and choking the guy to death.

A few months later the guy referred a friend to me that has done $500k in annuity business.

Moral: apparently the guy did not dislike us as much as we disliked him.

I've seen 2 kinds of obnoxious a-hole prospects:

One - they are just being themselves.

The other - they are testing you and will write a big check once you pass.

Just a personal observation.
 
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