Insurance Sucks

Insurance Sucks

“It’s a Necessary Evil”

“I’m paying for something I’m never going to use”

“Insurance companies are a bunch of blood sucking bastards”

I hear this on average 2-3 times a week, when business is slow. I’m not going to defend everything about insurance. You read some things like about insurance companies denying claims that should’ve been paid, and shady agents pocketing premiums and not binding coverage, and the millions of dollars the insurance industry spends on lobbyist. That sounds pretty bad. But, it’s like they say with attorneys, it’s the 99% that make us Good 1% look bad (joking).

As an insurance agent I’m not going to sit here and be an apostle for my industry. What I’d like to do is just give you some advice to help make the insurance part of your real estate transactions a little easier, and hopefully, if you know anyone in Florida, you can refer them to me for all of their business insurance and personal insurance needs.

So here’s some tips:

1. Pick an agent you really want to work with first. Have them get you quotes themselves, but also show them the quotes you’ve received. You already like this person, you want to work with them, and hopefully you trust them. If there’s something missing in the quote they can point it out, if there’s something wrong with the company they can let you know. And if you got a good deal and they can’t match it, they will tell you

2. Next go to three agents or less that you think are good. Most likely, if you go to three good insurance agents, meaning they know the area of insurance you need and have access to the insurance companies that right it, they’ll probably have accessed 90% of the insurance companies or more. You do not need to get a quote from everyone, it’ll be repetitive, useless and/or confusing

3. Give full disclosure. The more info the agent has the easier the whole process will be for you.

For Commercial Insurance, everything above applies, but also:

1. Don’t let a lesser agent quote your business. Good agents have good relationships with insurance brokers and underwriters and can get you better pricing and better terms and conditions. But, if the company already issued a quote, they can’t change it for 30-180 days depending on the company.

2. Don’t block out your premium. Underwriters know you’re not going to move for a 2% savings. But, they will not give you the best price, unless they know what price will win your business.

3. We need your loss history information from your past and current insurance company. It’s not that we don’t trust you, we don’t, but it doesn’t matter, the insurance company wants the official loss runs or loss history from your insurance companies. Just telling your agent,” I never had a claim”, will cost you money.

There’s more, but I don’t want to get boring. Let me know what you think about insurance and feel free to add your negative or positive comments, the blog isn’t public.

For more insurance info please contact me, Andrew Cohn at acohn@alcrisk.com, please visit my website, ALC Risk Solutions or call 786-664-7475.