15 Feb How Good Is the Hand-off in Your Agency?
How good is the hand-off in your agency?
I am not a big track & field person (although I have run nine 15K races), but it isn’t hard to appreciate the intricacies of many events and how timing and execution are often the key differentiators between winning and not winning.
One of the key events is the 4×100 relays. Without a smooth transition/hand-off from one team member to the other, the chance for success is greatly diminished. In actuality, the same applies to the insurance agency/brokerage world. When a producer has successfully landed a new account, how they “hand-off” the account to the service/support team could determine how well that account is serviced and how satisfied they are with their new agent.
Some good rules of thumb to consider that should generate a better hand-off:
- During the sales process, it might prove beneficial for the producer to provide the prospect with access to / knowledge of the support team that would have the responsibility of ensuring that the overall service needs of the customer are met. This is an approach used by many E&O Plus agencies.
- After the account is bound, the producer should meet with the team providing the ongoing service to the client to get everyone up to speed.
- Have a couple of sets of eyes to review the policies to ensure that they reflect what was agreed upon. The policies should then be delivered to the client by the producer or someone they designate in a timely fashion.
- Educate the team on the details of the account and their various exposures. The claims staff should definitely be included if the account generates a fair number of claims.
- Provide the team with the details of the client’s personnel that the agency staff will be interacting with.
- Provide the specific expectations of the customer. If they had a poor experience with their prior agent, the agency team should be advised of this issue and meet customer service expectations.
- The support staff should be aware of any agreements made by the producer to the client that were key to the agency landing the account. This may involve issues such as when certificates will be provided. Since the service team will probably be the one that needs to honor these agreements, they need to be aware of them.
- Any open items that need to be followed up on down the road.
Taking these steps should ensure that the client is provided the service to stay a customer for the foreseeable future. Without a smooth hand-off, things will fall thru the cracks. This may result in the loss of a customer or possibly an E&O claim at some point.