Insuserve-1

One constant in the insurance industry is change, and there are two ways to deal with that change – resist or adapt. Insuserve-1’s mission is to help agents and brokers adapt so they can meet and exceed customer expectations, grow their businesses, and adjust to change effectively.

Santosh B. Kumaar, the CEO of Insuserve-1 says, “many companies are still facing issues with fully integrating policy administration technology into their day-to-day operations. Sometimes retail agents and brokers, who have been in the business for a long time, can be slow to adopt insur-tech solutions.”Reasons for this are varied: some are simply change averse, for some it is an issue of cost or concerns about downtime while implementing new systems. While there is a recognition among most that automation is vital to keeping up with competitors and meeting the expectations of today’s customers, they also worry that the adoption of new technologies will remove them farther from those customers.

One way businesses can adapt is by partnering with a business process outsourcing partner (BPO) like Insuserve-1. Amy Mauk, Insuserve- 1’s Director of Sales and Implementation says, ‘we are finding that many businesses are somewhere along the process of adopting technology solutions for policy administration processes. They may have an agency management system that isn’t being utilized to its full capability, or they may have fragmented systems in place and are still managing some parts of the process manually. At Insuserve-1, we address this by meeting the client wherever they are in the process, adapting to meet their needs. We help streamline back-office processes, so they are free to make adjustments in their front office.”

A common theme among today’s agencies is the issue of hiring and retaining quality personnel. The importance of the CSR and Account Manager roles cannot be overstated. They act as the liaison between the client, the producer, and the carriers.

Their work needs to be done quickly and efficiently, yet it also needs to be done right. But talk to any Account Manager and they’ll tell you they’re overwhelmed. Mauk points out that “when Account Managers and CSRs are overwhelmed the quality of service in an agency can suffer – phone calls aren’t returned in a timely manner, certificates aren’t issued on time, and important policy administration tasks, such as policy and endorsement checking can fall by the wayside.”

Allowing in-house staff to delegate routine tasks to an outsourcing partner can lighten their workload and lead to greater efficiency and better customer service. When experienced insurance professionals are hard to come by, retention is that much more important. Kumaar recounted the experience of one of his clients, “The client had recently lost a couple of Account Managers and was having difficulty hiring. We were able to take over all the routine policy administration tasks being handled by their in-house CSRs. The company then promoted those CSRs to Account Managers. Those Account Managers were able to focus their attention on learning their new roles and providing great service to the agency’s customers.”

The insurance industry is, at its core, a relationship-centered business and Kumaar says, “our business is about people, not just processes. Companies that partner with Insuserve-1, aren’t just gaining processing capacity and capability, they’re adding Insuserve-1 people to their team. We stress the concept that outsourcing with is a way for agencies to shift their focus back to their customers by leaving the bulk of their policy administration tasks to us.”