 |
 |
 |
Making benefits more accessible miQuotes provides online help for the tough risks of the employee benefits community By Phil Zinkewicz A company’s distribution of benefits to its employees—life, health, disability, auto and homeowners, and so on—can take many forms. The ideal situation is that an agent or broker represents an organization that has a certain minimum number of workers, with like characteristics and very little turnover, thereby simplifying billing and employee payroll deduction. The same situation could apply to an association or other kinds of affinity groups. If the organization providing the benefits has a fairly sophisticated human resources department, the technicalities are easily dealt with and the employer is happy, the employees are happy, the agent or broker is happy and the insurer is happy. But what about situations that are less than ideal? Restaurants and nursing homes, for example, where employees may not have like characteristics and where turnover is rapid, are usually not attractive to insurance companies selling benefit programs. Some organizations either have HR facilities that are limited or no HR facilities at all, making the idea of employee payroll deduction plans unappealing to the employers. These kinds of organizations are what Greg Schlatter, founder of miQuotes, LLC, calls the “black sheep” of the employee benefits community because they are said to have “bad working conditions.” In an interview with Rough Notes, Schlatter offered this unorthodox point of view: “Too many times, companies and brokers alike turn down business because of the misconception that bad working conditions spell out failure in the enrollment. Marketing departments across the country are locked into the mindset that if you cannot get face-to-face enrollments or provide insurance via payroll deductions, nobody will buy insurance. miQuotes.com takes exception to this myth. In fact, poor working conditions can mean big money and less work.” Schlatter says his firm has developed a method for employees of companies, members of associations or just the general public to apply for a variety of insurance plans, 24/7, from the privacy of their homes or offices. “The miQuotes platform,” he says, “can be referred to as the anti-voluntary insurance program by offering individual insurance plans sold through employer and association sponsorship.” In this respect, according to Schlatter, “premiums are paid directly to the insurance company” so there are no payroll deductions, list bills, on-site enrollments or strict participation guidelines to deal with. “That’s something that most HR directors can only dream about,” he says. No more black sheep Schlatter says that, through the use of sophisticated and proprietary Web-based technology, brokers can offer a “customized suite of products” to not only the mainstream group market but also the “black sheep” organizations. “No longer will associations, restaurants, nursing centers or other companies with high turnover issues be turned away from allowing their full- or part-time employees access to quality insurance policies,” he says. “Term life, permanent life, cancer, critical care, accident, medical as well as auto and home insurance are a few of the products that are available under this platform. In support of the broker, miQuotes has also made it possible to provide fully customized Web quoting engines and application tracking systems to groups as small as 10 or as many as 1 million employees. All fulfillment is done through a nationwide call center with a quality commission paid to the broker.” In short, Schlatter says, miQuotes can expand a broker’s office into areas not normally penetrated, through the use of Web-based quoting engines for their commercial, group or association accounts. Schlatter says that miQuotes can be useful to independent agents who want to expand their books of business. “There are many property and casualty insurance agents who would love to sell life insurance and related products, but they don’t do much because they don’t have the staff. We become the staff for the agent,” says Schlatter. Tools for agents Adamant in his support for the independent agency system, Schlatter says that his experience lies in that area of insurance. “I had my own agency for a time and worked as a managing general underwriter for an insurance company. My goal is to assist agents with the tools to help them sell more insurance. It’s as simple as that.” Schlatter says that, while his organization has concentrated on life and related products since it was founded in 2000 (miQuotes has processed more than 35,000 requests for insurance and currently has more than $1.3 billion of life insurance in force), it has received a significant number of requests from property and casualty insurance agents who want to know how the system can be adapted for P-C products. In fact, says Schlatter, a brand-new auto and homeowners product has been designed. “We are constantly customizing at the agent level,” he says. “In addition, this state-of-the-art platform is available at the insurance company level and can display only that company’s products for distribution to their specific field force. Customized Web sites, application tracking and fillable forms can be created within minutes for ease of use at the IMO (independent marketing organization), MGA or broker levels.” One of miQuotes’ satisfied customers is the Thomas McGee Insurance Agency, an all-lines firm in Kansas City, Missouri. Bob Tretter runs the agency’s life and health operations. “We use miQuotes in two ways,” says Tretter. “First, we use it as a rounding-off tool. Let’s say we’ve already written the medical and we go to the HR person and say here’s a great system with great products and you can have your employees apply online on their own time. The HR person doesn’t have to do the billing or the payroll. New benefits are being offered to their employees with no work, no extra burden. Second, sometimes an HR person doesn’t want to disrupt the work time of the employees with face-to-face meetings with insurance company representatives. Sometimes it’s difficult to get all the employees together for one meeting. miQuotes eliminates those problems.” Declares Schlatter: “We believe we are taking IT to new levels in the insurance business.” * For more information: |
|
|||||||||||||||||||||||||
|
||||||||||||||||||||||||||
