MAPD/PDP Marketing Question

[Pancur]

Hi,

We have recently added MAPD/PDP products to our agency menu. As every year we plan to advertise our agency outside; usually @ local church picnics. It's very simple; we have a table and a banner with the agency logo and our products: Auto, Home, Business, Life, Health and now Medicare. We don't mention insurance companies on the banner and we are not going to discuss medicare plan specifics or distribute plan information. We want to advertise our agency not the medicare specific plans.

Questions:

1. Is it considered a Medicare Marketing Event?
2. Can we use the word "Medicare" on our banner?
3. What if a person passing by ask about mapd/pdp? What are we allowed to say? Are we allowed to schedule an appointment at our office and take SOA? Can we take the person's phone number and call back or he/she has to call us first?

I know that these questions sound very unprofessional but we are new @ Medicare and the marketing rules are sometimes confusing. We want to do it the right way.

Please help. Thank you.

 

[GreenSky]

Just file it as an informal sales meeting. You can inform all your companies if you want.

No big deal and now you are allowed to do damn near anything you'd like.

Rick

 

[FLM2]

Hi,

We have recently added MAPD/PDP products to our agency menu. As every year we plan to advertise our agency outside; usually @ local church picnics. It's very simple; we have a table and a banner with the agency logo and our products: Auto, Home, Business, Life, Health and now Medicare. We don't mention insurance companies on the banner and we are not going to discuss medicare plan specifics or distribute plan information. We want to advertise our agency not the medicare specific plans.

Questions:

1. Is it considered a Medicare Marketing Event?
2. Can we use the word "Medicare" on our banner?
3. What if a person passing by ask about mapd/pdp? What are we allowed to say? Are we allowed to schedule an appointment at our office and take SOA? Can we take the person's phone number and call back or he/she has to call us first?

I know that these questions sound very unprofessional but we are new @ Medicare and the marketing rules are sometimes confusing. We want to do it the right way.

Please help. Thank you.

If it was my office I would get a CMS compliant Banner or Sign from one or more of your MAPD/PDP companies and use that instead of adding it to your banner.

Then, if someone walks in with questions you can have them sign an SOA and go right into a sales presentation.

 

[foxmfox1]

I would think the companies you are contracted with would have to approve and formally calendar it as a "sales event".

 

[yorkriver1]

I would think the companies you are contracted with would have to approve and formally calendar it as a "sales event".

Informal and formal are calendared as you describe, and as Rick said, would be reported to each carrier represented (note, some carriers don't want agents to do this without prior vetting, so check each carrier). The difference between the two types is that formal has a timed specific presentation, one time, say the presenter gives a 30 minute talk at 1pm.

Informal is the format the OP stated, where there is a table at a place, typically for several hours, where attendees like at health fairs, etc. or customers (like in a WalMart) can visit the table at will and receive specific plan information, or buy a plan on the spot. One specific restriction, the reps at the table can't actively pull people over. They can smile and greet only. I have always had anyone I give detailed info to sign a SOA.

Informal events have the same rules in that the place, date and time range are filed. If the event cancels, there are rules about how to do that, same as a formal event.

Either way, with a filed event, there is the possibility of secret shoppers, sometimes from carriers, sometimes from CMS.

At an educational event, not needing to be filed, company specific information can't be distributed, etc. AHIP and carrier training addresses these issues.