Many agencies view the opening or acquisition of branch officesas a way to grow and expand their market reach. Too often, though,I find that after agencies set up branch offices, they neglect tomanage them. As a result, I inevitably find the branches havemore–and more serious–problems than the main offices do.

Procedures

I often find branch offices' procedures differ from those of themain office, usually without management's knowledge and often inviolation of the agency's official procedures. Sometimes branchoffices must use different automation procedures because of howtheir automation systems are designed, but those are minor problemscompared with ignoring the agency's standard procedures. Besidesreducing efficiency, this creates large E&O exposures for theentire agency.