In a business that is absolutely brutal to succeed in, just like it is a real piece of work to find the best life insurance company for your situation, it is even harder to find an agent that can not just help you succeed, but treat you with respect along the way.

I’ve been down this road before, and I know this is redundant but it is one of those stranger than fiction life insurance business practices that I know for a fact has been going on for longer than the 35 years I’ve been around the business. Life insurance companies recruit like crazy. They give rewards to agents who refer anyone that might be a recruit and give them a slice of the business if the agent actually comes on board. They do this knowing, but never telling new life insurance agent recruits, that 95% or more of them will not make it a year in the business. Life insurance companies do this knowing that 95% of new agents will only sell to their immediate family and friends and as soon as the going gets tougher than that, they fall off and go somewhere  easier to make a living. Life insurance companies hire the completely ignorant new agents to sell to their own family and friends because they know, for the most part, it won’t come back on them.

There is a price for being successful. Once we get out in the real fray we can’t afford to be ignorant any more. If I give someone bad advice they can file complaints or go after my errors and omissions insurance. The 95% aren’t around long enough to mess up and even if they do, they’re own family and friends will probably just cancel the insurance once they are out of the business and not make a scene.

So, let’s consider the 5% that do make it. Is it because they are the best, the brightest, the most educated in life insurance matters, the most compassionate about your money and putting you before them in the pecking order of the hopefully win/win relationship? The honest answer is no. The 5% left are mostly made up of the sale closing elite, those people who walk away from every meeting somehow having made a sale. Very seldom can the occurrence be characterized as a win/win situation in which the customer has received the most benefit from the product purchased and the agent has received compensation commensurate with their treatment of the client.

I know I live in this dream world where closing techniques don’t exist, and agents never steer a client toward a higher compensation product, and agents stay in touch with their clients for the sole purpose of serving the client, but it’s my dream world. If I can’t make every agent magically be great agents, I can give life insurance purchasers hope that there are agents out there who treat you with respect and dignity.

All of this to say that every day there are more and more victims of bad life insurance agents, simply because there are so few good ones. It might just mean that you have to pay more than you should. It might mean you end up with a life insurance product that makes a lot of money for the agent but isn’t appropriate for your needs or budget. It might mean that you get declined for life insurance when, if you had used a more knowledgeable agent, the application would have been approved.

Bottom line. I, me, we at Hinerman Group are here to serve those who are mistreated in the life insurance application process. We are here to turn declines into approvals. We’re here to listen to what you need and get it for you within your budget. I’ve run my business in favor of my customers since I started and have never strayed from that. Call or email me directly if you have any questions or need help with a life insurance problem. My name is Ed Hinerman. Let’s talk