Insurance Sales Agent

Insurance Sales Agent

When people first encounter an insurance company they almost always come in contact with an entity called an agent. According to the definition of agent in any glossary, an agent is someone who represents a company’s product, a middle man if you will. In this case the agent represents an insurance carrier.

That is pretty basic but there are two kinds of agent, independent and captive (sometimes called an exclusive agent) An independent agent represents many insurance companies while a captive, or exclusive agent represents only one insurance company.

In either scenario the agent is your primary contact with your insurance company. Of course an agent can’t be there all the time so any good insurance company will provide a twenty-four-hours-a-day-seven-day-a-week eight hundred number for you to use.

However most issues with your policy can be handled by your local agent during the normal scope of business hours. Depending on your weekly schedule you may want to find an agent who keeps Saturday hours as well as Monday thru Friday hours.

Agents generally do not handle claims. You should be given yet again another 24-7/365 number for calims. It is a conflict of interest for the agent who wrote the policy to handle the claim as well. Often the agent tends to believe their insured is never at fault. So in the interests of fairness to all parties invovled the agent can’t and doesn’t get involved.

Not to discourage anyone from making the choice they feel best suits them i.e. Independent or captive agent. You will recognize the captive agents by names like Allstate and State Farm. Carriers represented by Independents are names like The Hartford and Safeco. It is however the humble opinion of the Insurance Goose you are better suited with an independent agent as they represent multiple carriers and can find the coverage with the carrier best suited for your needs.

It does need to be said the final decision rests in your hands. Due diligence should be practiced in any choice you make. Maybe even more so in insurance than any other of life’s important choices. Look up company ratings, check with the dept. of insurance for your state for complaints and ask around about the insurance sales agents reputation. If the agent has been around any amount of time he or she will have a reputation, how it sonuds is up to the agent.