Agents Look To Beat Banks At Their Own Game

Insurance agents who don't want to surrender their independence by selling their firms to a financial institution can still capitalize on the opportunities offered by the cross-selling of banking products, industry officials note.

For example, new to the scene to help independent agents market banking-related products is Capital Avenue.

Sandy Deeley, chief executive officer of the agency Atlantic/Smith, Cropper and Deeley, LLC of Ocean City, Md., is founder of a commercial banking product program. Based in New York City and Hartford, Conn., he said Capital Avenue can provide independent agents with financial products for their clients over the Internet, and receive referral fees for doing so.

The banking services, handled by National Cooperative Bank of Washington, works through a co-branded Web site that allows customers continuous access to products and services, available in all states. (More information is available at www.capitalavenue.net.)

Meanwhile, a bank created by an insurance association to make bank products available through independent agents is expanding its reach. Assurance Partners Bank, the savings bank of the National Association of Mutual Insurance Companies, received approval at the end of July to begin doing business in all 50 states, said Scott Poore, vice president of marketing for the bank.

The Carmel, Ind.-based bank, near NAMIC headquarters, is seen as an alternative for agents feeling the heat of competition from bank acquisitions and direct writers banking services, and who want to provide banking products for their clients, Mr. Poore said.

With 250 agencies on board today in 19 states, Assurance is looking to aggressively move into the West and Midwest and build its agency list to 300 by the end of the year, Mr. Poore noted.

(For another perspective on the advantages of agents getting into banking services, see page 14 for a story by the president of InsurBanc, chartered by the Independent Insurance Agents of America.)

Reproduced from National Underwriter Property & Casualty/Risk & Benefits Management Edition, October 15, 2001. Copyright 2001 by The National Underwriter Company in the serial publication. All rights reserved.Copyright in this article as an independent work may be held by the author.

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Agents Look To Beat Banks At Their Own Game

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