American Agent & Broker March 2010
Cover Story
BringIt Home: Tapping Into The Home Healthcare Revolution
More aging baby boomers are turning to home healthcare as an alternative to hospital stays or nursing homes. The trend presents agents and brokers with the opportunity to educate their home care agency clients on the risks that they face.
Features
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Recession Doesen's Diminsh Enthusiasm For Employee Benefits Sales And Services
While the recession is putting a strain on the earnings produced by the employee benefits business of independent agents and brokers, there is a consensus among at least three top firms that the segment remains a major generator of revenue.
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Floating Away
AA&B spoke with three wholesalers/program administrators specializing in boat, yacht and marina insurance about what they're seeing in the current market and how retail agents and brokers can "shore up" this specialty business until the seas are calm.
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Opening Your Agency
The number of start-up insurance agencies is growing and most new agencies are small, growing fast and headed by younger principals. Learn the size more important steps to take within the first 90 days of opening your agency.
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What Will Healthcare Reform Do To Independent Agencies?
Despite deep divisions within its own ranks and united opposition from Republicans, Democrats appeared to be moving closer and closer at year's end to landmark legislation.
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Small Is Beautiful
Big accounts mean better bottom-line profits. Yet as any successful agent or broker knows, if you want to provide comprehensive service, drawing a line in the sand regarding a preferred account size isn't always easy.
Columns
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Healthcare Reform: Not Dead, Just Resting
With a Republican Senate win tipping the Congressional balance away from the Democrats (see "Legislative Roundup"), healthcare reform has officially been relegated to the back burner.
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Credit Scoring: Tough To Explain, Hard To Beat
In the early 1990s I was scratching out a living as an underwriting manager when my phone rang with one of the most asked questions in our industry: "What does my credit score have to do with my car insurance rates?"
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Negligent Agent Escapes Liability
A Texas insurance broker admitted he was negligent in failing to procure insurance for his client and still avoided liability because the damages incurred by the putative insured would not have been covered even if the policy was acquired as ordered.
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Choosing Right From Right
Welcome to March, when we once again join the CPCU Society and many other fine insurance organizations in celebrating National Ethics Month!
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State Of The Market? Take A Guess
Sometimes writers and consultants are too long winded. They take a roundabout way to avoid bitter reality. But for those who prefer brevity, I'll get to the point: This market sucks. It is the worst insurance market since 1933.
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Timing Is Everything
For most people of my generation, today's technology gadgets, gizmos and thingamabobs are wonderful--and frightening--advances.
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There's No Substitute Fora Telephone Prospecting
It's easy to take talking on the phone for granted. But a telephone prospecting call is something very different.
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PR Drives Antitrust Repeal Efforts
Every so often, someone in Congress decides to go after that tempting but misguided political target: the repeal of the insurance industry's limited anti-trust exemption.
Departments
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Letters
Pet peeves I seldom respond to articles, but Matthew Marrone's article, "When client dissatisfaction moves to E&O claims" (AA&B 10/09)
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N.C. Cities Rule For Small Businesses
The two markets with the nation's top scores for small-business vitality sit 140 miles apart in North Carolina.
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Mobile App Downloads To Top $6.2 Billion This Year
Mobile phone users will spend $6.2 billion downloading applications this year, up from $4.2 billion last year, according to a report from Gartner.
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Ongoing Job Cuts Equal Higher Worker Productivity
As job cuts continue, U.S. productivity has risen 2.5 percent an hour in 2009, according to The Conference Board Inc.
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Banks Fatten On $3 Billion In Insurance Brokerage Fees In 3Q '09
Insurance brokerage fee income at banks hit $3.05 billion for the third quarter of 2009, the highest level in the last 5 quarters, according to the data compiled by Michael White Associates LLC.
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Scant Insurance Coverage To Hurt Haiti Rebuilding
The magnitude 7.0 January earthquake that caused catastrophic death and destruction in Haiti created hundreds of millions in economic damage, but insurance coverage for losses is minimal, according to modeling firms.
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Contractor Recovery On Hold For 2010
Some 90 percent of the nation's contractors expect no recovery in 2010, according to a construction hiring and business outlook forecast released by the Associated General Contractors of America.
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Fire The Client? Sometimes It's Worth It
"Breaking Up Is Hard to Do," Neil Sedaka observed. It's difficult for an insurance professional to fire a client, just as it is for any other businessperson, especially in an economic downturn, when new clients may be scarce.
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Mr. Brown Goes To Washington
What a difference one election can make.
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Rosenfeld Einstein: A Family Affair
Although Rosenfeld Einstein (RE) has ascended into its third-generation of family ownership.
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Insure High Net Worth Clients
Surrounded by personal lines property and casualty insurance, Main Street insurance agencies see the same type of risks day in and day out.
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Market Directory: Boat & Yacht Insurance
