Risk focused advisers have sent a message to product manufacturers that the support they seek from them continues to reflect the critical, basic and fundamental components associated with the life insurance advice process.
Notwithstanding the turbulent period being experienced by most elements of the life insurance sector, our recent survey of advisers has reinforced the message that advisers want their providers to deliver for them in areas including underwriting, claims and business support.
Asked to rank the top five support services from life companies they need most to help deliver their services to clients, 75% of advisers nominated access to underwriters, followed by 53% who nominated claims services, with 45% of those taking our survey indicating they needed access to technical services.
BDM support was selected by 40% of advisers, while the least popular options included online marketing tools (12%), compliance support (10%) and zero commission/stripped products at 8%.
Interestingly, only 13% of the adviser community said they were seeking soft skills training from the life companies.
Elsewhere, asked their top five most important considerations when deciding which products will best address their client’s insurance needs, advisers responded as follows:
- Key policy definitions
- Product features
- Price
- Reputation of the insurer’s claims services and processes
- Underwriting services
Key components ranking outside the top five most important considerations included new business administration services, ability to lodge electronic applications, the relationship with their BDM/business contacts and remuneration flexibility.
As the industry enters a three-year transition to the new Life Insurance Framework environment, this feedback from advisers gives perspective to the areas that remain most important to them in a broader sense, in terms of what they seek from their providers and how they make decisions about what solutions will best serve their clients’ needs.
A fundamental aspect hasn’t been mentioned. This is that life offices get it right with their admin staff particularly. How often do we find that we submit applications and then weeks later call the life office and they say ‘oh, we haven’t fully assessed it yet. There are outstandings which you need to follow up on’. Then they tell you what’s needed to finalise the application. By then 2 or 3 weeks have gone by. Alternatively, the life offices will send out some outstandings. The adviser gets that done and a week later the life office asks for a further requirement.
Really, all life office internal staff should be salaried with a bonus component paid only on completing policies. Most wouldn’t even know where they lived if the bus didn’t drop them at their front doors and these same people are involved in large sums of money changing hands with the potential to pay out even larger figures. The focus needs to be on upgrading everything the life offices do internally.
Well said Paul. I have been a Risk adviser for 9 years now and whilst i have got used to poor back office support from certain Insurers i have found that all the Life offices have been slipping lately. It is getting harder to rely on their back office support and all too often they do not do what they have assured me they will do.
The life offices have dropped the commission paid to advisers whilst at the same time dropped their levels of service and raised premiums. Is this just all a big scam to rid advisers from the industry so they can go back to selling their JUNK direct policies so they never have to pay claims?
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