P & C Help

[AverageJoe]

I have The Hartford, and they arent giving you anything special that I don't have and Hartford is Pretty selective in what they write, so I think you will have problems, and to add, I am EXTREMELY surprised Hartford would give you a contract with ZERO experience or knowledge.

Hartford is also an IA carrier, I don't understand where they will give you a salary and provide training, etc.

I think you are extremely confused about what they are offering you. Hartford does have a Hartford school of insurance that is pretty expensive.

Something, Honestly, isnt adding up about all of this now.

my parents have been working with them for many years now, but you are right, they are not giving me anything special. please RBA. stop, slow your breathing, count 1 to 10 and relax. no need to be detective clouseau pink panther has already came out. they are not giving me a salary, but they are providing me an "appointed sales solutions coordinator" and training in their "EBC system quoter"

im appointed through thier PAC (payroll alliance center), but havent finalized yet bc of the holidays and I havent send me 30% down on my E&O to bind, but everything is in place, the door is open, all i have to do in walk in, but before i walk in. I am cautious person and i want to make the right decision for both my family and I and The Hartford.

 

[NCAgent]

I have The Hartford, and they arent giving you anything special that I don't have and Hartford is Pretty selective in what they write, so I think you will have problems, and to add, I am EXTREMELY surprised Hartford would give you a contract with ZERO experience or knowledge.

It sounds like the family gives enough business to The Hartford that they were willing to give him a chance. It's kinda like how I got an appointment with a carrier because I worked with a well-known producing agent and when I left he called in a favor for me. Sorta similar I guess.

The Hartford is good for some horses, but not for the zebras. You will want a few more carriers but you can't write everything, Joe. Look at everything that you have access to for businesses, and look at who your family is trying to attract now. Try and find out 2-3 of them and then get carriers to match those. You want to keep 2-4 carriers happy rather than 5-10 that you never use.

Once you know the industries that you can attract and want to write, ask about it again. You aren't painting enough of a picture. Each cluster/MGA/Aggregator is going to have different appetites as well, so until you answer this for yourself then you can't eve research who you want yet.

I think a nice overall span in FL might be Travelers, The Hartford, Liberty Mutual, and Progressive commercial auto, at a minimum. They are rather broad, found in many clusters, and might do you well until you figure out the niches you want to handle.

Iroquois group has Travelers, Hartford, Liberty Mutual, Zurich, Hanover, and etc. The Hartford can be competitive if they want the business, but you'll honestly find them to be like shoving a square peg into a triangle hole for other kinds of business.

 

[Guest]

my parents have been working with them for many years now, but you are right, they are not giving me anything special. please RBA. stop, slow your breathing, count 1 to 10 and relax. no need to be detective clouseau pink panther has already came out. they are not giving me a salary, but they are providing me an "appointed sales solutions coordinator" and training in their "EBC system quoter"

im appointed through thier PAC (payroll alliance center), but havent finalized yet bc of the holidays and I havent send me 30% down on my E&O to bind, but everything is in place, the door is open, all i have to do in walk in, but before i walk in. I am cautious person and i want to make the right decision for both my family and I and The Hartford.

Well, OK then,

Every company will have a coverage that other carriers don't have.

You have been given a wealth of info from a number of posters on this thread, and you seem to ignore or come up with a meaningless reply to all of the answers you are asking.

I am finished now, time to go watch some football and drink a few beers.

Good luck in your ventures.

 

[AverageJoe]

The Hartford is good for some horses, but not for the zebras. You will want a few more carriers but you can't write everything, Joe. Look at everything that you have access to for businesses, and look at who your family is trying to attract now. Try and find out 2-3 of them and then get carriers to match those. You want to keep 2-4 carriers happy rather than 5-10 that you never use.

Once you know the industries that you can attract and want to write, ask about it again. You aren't painting enough of a picture. Each cluster/MGA/Aggregator is going to have different appetites as well, so until you answer this for yourself then you can't eve research who you want yet.

IIroquois group has Travelers, Hartford, Liberty Mutual, Zurich, Hanover, and etc. The Hartford can be competitive if they want the business, but you'll honestly find them to be like shoving a square peg into a triangle hole for other kinds of business.

noob, could you explain in more detail the first two paragraphs that i have "quoted". i got lost in translation halfway throough the first paragraph of the two.

and for the last paragraph, would iroquois allow a new agent/agency wiht no experience? do you know where I could get a hold of them to explain my scenario other than an email (which i just did)
would you recommend this group above all others?

 

[NCAgent]

noob, could you explain in more detail the first two paragraphs that i have "quoted". i got lost in translation halfway throough the first paragraph of the two.

and for the last paragraph, would iroquois allow a new agent/agency wiht no experience? do you know where I could get a hold of them to explain my scenario other than an email (which i just did)
would you recommend this group above all others?

Basically this: Until you know what businesses you want to write, you can't even go out and find carriers or people to help you. Everyone wants to write different things and you need to align yourself with the people who want to write what you have. The Hartford will write a few types of policies and businesses but they don't want the risk of all kinds, so they are very uncompetitive in the things they don't want; for the things they want, however, they are pretty good. They are relatively "Vanilla" in things so the weird stuff you get isn't going to go well through the Hartford, aka the zebras.

We don't know what you are trying to write. You just say "businesses." We don't know if those are construction companies, miners, restaurants, medical practices, government contracts, research and development, IT consultants, roofers, chemical manufacturing, farms, real-estate agents, international traders and bankers, other insurance agents, mortgage companies, butchers, schools/government workers, engineering firms, law firms, mortuaries, liquor sales, or what. All of these things need different coverages and a lot of companies don't want to handle ALL of them, they will probably handle 2-3 of them. So you need to give more than just "I have businesses, I want carriers, who can I use that will be awesome" and that is it. This sh!t isn't personal lines where things are very uniform.

I don't know how to contact Iroquois in FL. You will need to look on the website and do some e-mails and call people who can help you. I don't know how they operate in FL, which could be very different than what they do here. I don't know the appetites of the companies in FL nor how competitive they are. You are going to have to do some digging on that somehow by looking at commercial clusters or talking to commercial agents in your area. And now the networking part of being an agent starts...

Even then, they won't be able to help you too much until you know what 2-3 SIC codes you want to focus the most on and then learn from there, since they will all say how competitive they are on different things and their experience.

EDIT:

In case you aren't sure how much of a jungle this is, check the link:

http://www.sec.gov/info/edgar/siccodes.htm

That is what you have to work from. Imagine being an expert on each of those, knowing all those nuances, and knowing which carriers are competitive with all of those. That is like memorizing the IRS tax codes- good luck with that. So pick a few and work from there, adding more as you feel comfortable.

 

[Guest]

I want to add, for the various businesses you think you will write, you dont even know the difference between preferred business and E&S, do you even know what E&S is, and then add in Premuim Financing and minimum earned premiums.

See man, not to bash you but there are 1000 things you don't know that you NEED to know.

Take Personal lines for example, not all insurance companies will issue a policy for anyone, for example, State Farm, will not issue a policy for someone with a DUI or that needs a SR22,

In my State, on restraunts, Allstate will issue a policy, but not if they have a deep fat fryer.

Would you even know to ask questions like that?

We could give you 1 or 10,000 or a millions different scenerios, but your best and smartest bet is to work as a producer and LEARN and then become your own agent, when you make a contract with that agent, you can have it in the contract that you can BUY your policies from them, so you arent losing any clients.

NUFF SAID!

 

[AverageJoe]

Basically this: Until you know what businesses you want to write, you can't even go out and find carriers or people to help you. Everyone wants to write different things and you need to align yourself with the people who want to write what you have. The Hartford will write a few types of policies and businesses but they don't want the risk of all kinds, so they are very uncompetitive in the things they don't want; for the things they want, however, they are pretty good. They are relatively "Vanilla" in things so the weird stuff you get isn't going to go well through the Hartford, aka the zebras.

We don't know what you are trying to write. You just say "businesses." We don't know if those are construction companies, miners, restaurants, medical practices, government contracts, research and development, IT consultants, roofers, chemical manufacturing, farms, real-estate agents, international traders and bankers, other insurance agents, mortgage companies, butchers, schools/government workers, engineering firms, law firms, mortuaries, liquor sales, or what. All of these things need different coverages and a lot of companies don't want to handle ALL of them, they will probably handle 2-3 of them. So you need to give more than just "I have businesses, I want carriers, who can I use that will be awesome" and that is it. This sh!t isn't personal lines where things are very uniform.

I don't know how to contact Iroquois in FL. You will need to look on the website and do some e-mails and call people who can help you. I don't know how they operate in FL, which could be very different than what they do here. I don't know the appetites of the companies in FL nor how competitive they are. You are going to have to do some digging on that somehow by looking at commercial clusters or talking to commercial agents in your area. And now the networking part of being an agent starts...

Even then, they won't be able to help you too much until you know what 2-3 SIC codes you want to focus the most on and then learn from there, since they will all say how competitive they are on different things and their experience.

probably the majority of those business that you mention are ones that i will encounter with my parent's companies. Monday, i am going to ask these necassary questions to The Hartford and see what there appetite is. then look for other carriers to fill my other needs.

Noob, knowing that I have never written a policy, do you think with all the amenitites that The Hartford is giving me wil i be able to properly insure and write a policy? and should i go ahead and get someone from the hartford to do split policies with until i get the hang of everything? and if so, once i have learned the necessary steps to writing a policy by myself would they allow me?

 

[NCAgent]

sorry for re-editing that RBA while you were posting ^_^

Premium financing is definitely an issue as well and getting that setup. Or worker's comp audits and explaining why a 1/1 effective date for WC is good for companies, and things like that.

E&S and standard/preferred lines took me a little bit to understand just because I didn't realize the classifications like that. Especially since E&S means preferred's don't want it, but occasionally a preferred will go ahead and do it, too, so you need to see why. For example, Joe, your E&O is an E&S E&O since you are new. That is how I knew legal coverages were part of the limits, not over and above. I just learned that from experience, nothing else.

BELIEVE me, I'm not an expert. I know enough to know that I need someone to help me. I'm totally new to commercial, but I know enough to look at what questions to ask and what things to keep in mind. Underwriters like information for these things because they can apply credits to companies as well for competition, something you don't see in personal lines.
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Noob, knowing that I have never written a policy, do you think with all the amenitites that The Hartford is giving me wil i be able to properly insure and write a policy? and should i go ahead and get someone from the hartford to do split policies with until i get the hang of everything? and if so, once i have learned the necessary steps to writing a policy by myself would they allow me?

YES, go find someone. Do a plit, like 60/40 or something with you getting the 40 and split renewals, but you keep the book. The Hartford can only do so much because everything is Hartford-flavored in what they teach you. Hartford will say "hell yeah submit it, we'll look at it" whereas an agent will say "I think that Travelers or Zurich have a better program, go find someone to help you with that."

You really might be best working in an agency where you have book ownership rights and get training that way. Or something. See, you want the commissions, ownership, and training. That is a bit of a losing proposition for whomever you want to work for. So you would be best in getting someone more experienced to come in with you and make them a part of YOUR LLC.

Here is the thing: The hartford doesn't own the clients, YOU do. The Hartford just likes the business, but you can roll the clients anywhere you want pretty much whenever you want (though as a common practice and courtesy, most companies wait until renewal.) So the Hartford can't stop you doing anything with the clients except terminate your contract- doing a split means you do commission splits outside of the Hartford, they have no control over that.

The fact that you are doing ALL of those businesses means you need someone to come help. Flat out, enough said. There is no way around it.

 

[FLInsa]

AverageJoe, I haven't been to this forum in a very long time, and this morning remembered to come in to take a look and felt compelled to chime in since I am in Florida and 70% of what I write is commercial.

But first things first. Red Blooded American (a.k.a RBA), as someone else pointed out, it is not what you say buddy (the content of the message), it is how you say it. Taking a look at some of your posts they are offending and most are demeaning. I hope you don't talk to your clients that way. Can you imagine a client calling you asking if they should carry Assault & Battery and you replying: "You DUMB!, why don't you research first before asking me!". I am also surprised moderators have not taken action against you yet, so in the meantime for the first time ever I am putting someone in my ignore list and hopefully this will filter your posts. Wish you all the best though.

AverageJoe, now to some tough love and reality:
#1 - You say you have a very good pool of prospects that you can draw from which is your parent's payroll company.

That indeed can be an excellent source to build a book of business. I know of quite a few agents that are doing very nicely working with payroll companies. Question that I would have though is who would own the clients, you or your parents?

#2 - You say you have a "very good carrier in TheHartford" and they are willing to train you.

TheHartford indeed is a premier carrier but not for Florida so here is a shocker, FORGET about the Hartford. Hartford's Spectrum BOP is great but in Florida what you're going to hear from them is "sorry, we don't have any wind capacity" or, "well, that doesn't quite fit into our underwriting guidelines". Not to mention the little stuff they are currently writing in Florida are very conservative stuff and "cookie-cutter", i.e., ice cream parlors, sandwich shops, etc. And I haven't even mentioned their rates yet - because their rates are high.

And in regarding to their trainng, they are going to train you on their product which again, it is going to be limited to the stuff they write which may not be of much help because once you get out in the real "Florida world", things change totally. Unless of course you take their Producer School which as of June of 2011 it cost $3,500 to enroll.

#3 - So this leads to the $64,000 question: which carriers do I need and how do I get them.

To write commecial business today in Florida and be competitive at it, you will need at the very least carriers such as Montgomery, Allied (Nationwide), Zurich, Bankers, just to name a few, and also a couple of very good E&S wholesalers with access to some very competitive property rates.

So how do you get to these carriers. Well, first remove the thought from your mind completely that you can call a company such as Allied and "convince" them to appoint you simply because you are "good". It ain't happening. Even if you could fly or walk on water, these carriers in Florida will never appoint a newbie agent - unless of course you marry the daughter of the carrier's president or the president herself.

The only way a newbie agent with no BOB can access these carriers is either through a cluster or working with another local agent that does have access to these carriers. For a cluster, in Florida, you are going to want to join the SIAA. Period. There are a few others out there but the SIAA is the only one that has all the carriers you will need to be competitive. However, to join the SIAA you face two obstacles: 1) they don't like newbie agents for obvious reasons (E&O, loss ratios), and 2) you will need to pay to play because there will be a price of admission to get to their portfolio of carriers.

The other option, finding an agent that can help you may be your best option. But for this to work, you will need to come up with some creative offerings to offer the agent/agents you are about to approach because from reading your posts here I saw what you wanted which was access to the big carriers, ownership of the book, training, support and etc., which is great - for you. But what are you going to be offering the agent that you are about to approach for help? Because think about this, why would an agent allow you or anyone for that matter to "use" their carriers and have the potential to mess up their loss ratios, take time from their busy day (because if they are a truly successful agent they are very busy) training you, allow you to use their support systems and at the end of the day you just walk out with the business. So you are going to want to make it worthwhile for another agent to bite into what you will be offering them.

I hope this gives you some guidance.

 

[AverageJoe]

AverageJoe, I haven't been to this forum in a very long time, and this morning remembered to come in to take a look and felt compelled to chime in since I am in Florida and 70% of what I write is commercial.

But first things first. Red Blooded American (a.k.a RBA), as someone else pointed out, it is not what you say buddy (the content of the message), it is how you say it. Taking a look at some of your posts they are offending and most are demeaning. I hope you don't talk to your clients that way. Can you imagine a client calling you asking if they should carry Assault & Battery and you replying: "You DUMB!, why don't you research first before asking me!". I am also surprised moderators have not taken action against you yet, so in the meantime for the first time ever I am putting someone in my ignore list and hopefully this will filter your posts. Wish you all the best though.

AverageJoe, now to some tough love and reality:
#1 - You say you have a very good pool of prospects that you can draw from which is your parent's payroll company.

That indeed can be an excellent source to build a book of business. I know of quite a few agents that are doing very nicely working with payroll companies. Question that I would have though is who would own the clients, you or your parents?

#2 - You say you have a "very good carrier in TheHartford" and they are willing to train you.

TheHartford indeed is a premier carrier but not for Florida so here is a shocker, FORGET about the Hartford. Hartford's Spectrum BOP is great but in Florida what you're going to hear from them is "sorry, we don't have any wind capacity" or, "well, that doesn't quite fit into our underwriting guidelines". Not to mention the little stuff they are currently writing in Florida are very conservative stuff and "cookie-cutter", i.e., ice cream parlors, sandwich shops, etc. And I haven't even mentioned their rates yet - because their rates are high.

And in regarding to their trainng, they are going to train you on their product which again, it is going to be limited to the stuff they write which may not be of much help because once you get out in the real "Florida world", things change totally. Unless of course you take their Producer School which as of June of 2011 it cost $3,500 to enroll.

#3 - So this leads to the $64,000 question: which carriers do I need and how do I get them.

To write commecial business today in Florida and be competitive at it, you will need at the very least carriers such as Montgomery, Allied (Nationwide), Zurich, Bankers, just to name a few, and also a couple of very good E&S wholesalers with access to some very competitive property rates.

So how do you get to these carriers. Well, first remove the thought from your mind completely that you can call a company such as Allied and "convince" them to appoint you simply because you are "good". It ain't happening. Even if you could fly or walk on water, these carriers in Florida will never appoint a newbie agent - unless of course you marry the daughter of the carrier's president or the president herself.

The only way a newbie agent with no BOB can access these carriers is either through a cluster or working with another local agent that does have access to these carriers. For a cluster, in Florida, you are going to want to join the SIAA. Period. There are a few others out there but the SIAA is the only one that has all the carriers you will need to be competitive. However, to join the SIAA you face two obstacles: 1) they don't like newbie agents for obvious reasons (E&O, loss ratios), and 2) you will need to pay to play because there will be a price of admission to get to their portfolio of carriers.

The other option, finding an agent that can help you may be your best option. But for this to work, you will need to come up with some creative offerings to offer the agent/agents you are about to approach because from reading your posts here I saw what you wanted which was access to the big carriers, ownership of the book, training, support and etc., which is great - for you. But what are you going to be offering the agent that you are about to approach for help? Because think about this, why would an agent allow you or anyone for that matter to "use" their carriers and have the potential to mess up their loss ratios, take time from their busy day (because if they are a truly successful agent they are very busy) training you, allow you to use their support systems and at the end of the day you just walk out with the business. So you are going to want to make it worthwhile for another agent to bite into what you will be offering them.

I hope this gives you some guidance.

FLinsa, Thank you. this has been very helpful, i really appreciate you taking the time to do this.

As you were saying, from your first point, i would own the book of business, not my parents. My parents are giving me full control of this, im just working in their same office space and anyone that calls them they always mention, "my son just got his insurance license, in the future he will able to insure your business and personal needs." most say great, cant wait and other exciting replys. Some have already called and ask, "is your son ready yet?"

as for the Hartford, a lot of my parents clients are insured by them because of us. Mainly WC and GL never really anything else. THey have told me that they will not write contractors GL from the get go. do you still think its not worth for me to take that appointment or should i still forget about them?

as for SIAA, since most clusters do not want newbie agents, how can i convince them to let me in? should i go in as my parents payroll company-slash-insurance agency? showing our past record and our clientele? could that work? and if that doesnt work, because i do want the things you said, how can i make it appealing for an agency to let me on board with them? what should i give back to them all they are giving to me? and if SIAA, doesnt work, do you know of any commercial agencies around tampa/brooksville/wesley chapel/new port richey area that would take me in??

by the way, appreciate the intro. that guy is constantly not respectful on the majority of people's post that are asking for help.
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FLinsa,

what are your thoughts on Iroquois group? are they anything close to SIAA? you see I wrote them an email explaining my scenario that I have no experience and that i have no book of business as we speak, but I will be affiliated with my parents payroll and accounting business and they have called me back.