Who Here is Appointed with Kemper (not Through a Group or Aggregator)

indienoise

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When I look on their website it looks like mostly smaller agencies in my area are appointed with them.
What my question boils down to is, how are they to work with and are they very hard to keep happy? I'm doing ok with MGA's and the like, but would really like to have one preferred carrier with binding authority and no restrictive platform. If I have limited time to market preferred business and am concerned about maintaining an appointment, especially if I'm still farming business to Travelers, etc. via an MGA, are they a carrier who doesn't carry the six figure plus annual expectations of companies like Travelers or Safeco? Or will they be similar?
I've seen a few threads suggesting them as a good company to start out with, but not sure if that's just referring to their nonstandard product.
 
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When I asked our rep about production outside of the group, he said 1-2 packages a month would be fine. He's also incredibly lazy & we never hear from him so who really knows.

They're an underwriting driven company. They hit my book w/ literally 30% rate increases because (in their own admission) they got rates wrong. They'll flat out cancel a policy if signed forms aren't received. Their package policy makes it very difficult to figure out billing & their system is a huge pain in the butt.

They CAN be VERY competitive on preferred packaged business & competitive in general so I think it's a good carrier to have. Great product too. Shawnwalker will prob chime in because I believe he used to work for them.

I'm starting to think more & more that our experience as agents is heavily tied to how the carrier rep does their job. Some don't give a sh*t & you'll NEVER hear from them. Others defend their appointments and harass you. The next rep from the same company wouldn't..so who knows.

Overall they've been good for acquiring new business but bad for retaining because they're rates are so up/down. They also inspect interior/exterior on everything.

I didn't even know they had a non standard product. But, I'm not a bum & I don't work w/ filthy bums so I wouldn't know :-)
 
What can I say about Kemper Preferred.

Let me start with the rep statements Ins1822 made. I have seen reps that wear flip flops and hoodies on appointments and I have seen reps that are tailored to the hilt. I have seen reps who don't do a thing and the reps who are amazing at driving results. I have seen great Non standard reps make a huge difference in the agencies selling behavior and I have seen preferred reps fail miserably at any attempt to help the agency move the needle. I have seen reps add no value and reps add great value.

I think Simply put: when a rep is empowered to make decisions they have the opportunity to be great, when they have no decision making authority they have less of an opportunity to be great. (That does not mean that they can't be great) The impact of the Rep can vary dramatically. Some are passionate about their jobs and their roles; others want to know how many agencies they have to see in any one given week, check the box's and get home. (Not a great metric for the carrier to track but an easy one to default to)

Now Kemper. Kemper used to be Kemper Preferred and Kemper Specialty (Unitrin Specialty). I have great friends there today. It is a carrier that has been through A LOT of transition lately. I have fond memories of my Kemper Days.

I think I will leave it at that.
 
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