Selling insurance

A REPORT published in Panay News last month described an apparent hard sell by a sales agent of an insurance company on a college student. This report piqued my interest. Details are incomplete but it is gratifying that the Department of Trade and Industry (DTI) in Iloilo became involved.

The problem of a possible lack of empathy between a sales agent and a potential client is well recognized, particularly by Sun Life. As a response, this company has developed an online facility, “Advisor Match” in which the prospect can choose his sales agent. This is an innovative approach and I hope it is successful.

There are still uncertainties, however. Those who are educated in prestigious institutions may, at first sight, be what we need in a sales agent. But not always. Some are excellent professionals and become the financial advisor that we seek. Unfortunately, there are others, identical on paper (or its electronic equivalent), who have a supercilious disdain for the client. Not what we are looking for.

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The level of investment in insurance products in the Philippines remains low. I believe that part of the reason is that a proportion of life insurance agents exemplify undesirable characteristics as experienced by the college student last month in Iloilo.

SunLife Financial Asia executive vice president Claude Accum says: “The Philippine market, home to over 100 million people, is still very much underpenetrated”.

Yeah. We don’t like to be screwed.

I believe the insurance industry should do much more to put its house in order, because it is malpractice that depresses market size.

What insurance companies need to do is to follow the example of some banks who now have ‘customer care’ officers. These are people who have the tenacity to find out what is really happening and what can go wrong.

Not all sales agents are firmly tethered to the truth and busy management can be easily misled. Some insurance companies recognize the usual pyramidal structure but consider that their clients occupy the bottom layer, below that of agents. This makes it harder for the company to find out the truth when there is a disagreement as to what has happened. A manipulative agent can bamboozle the insurance company’s inadequate management so that the client is maltreated.

DTI mentioned the possibility of mediation. This can be very effective.

Consumer rights are mentioned in the Constitution. In my experience the Insurance Commission is ineffective when dealing with a recalcitrant insurance company.

Perhaps DTI can take over consumer protection from the Insurance Commission./PN