THE last two years have been challenging for everyone, Brexit followed by the pandemic has put a phenomenal amount of stress on all service sectors including our industry.
Brokers by their nature are adaptable and can make decisions quickly to alter procedures and processes and react to change. It is for this reason that we have seen Financial Broker introduced business to both the life offices and lenders increase over the last two years.
This has not been without pain, and the increased business and challenges associated with the pandemic has caused huge issues with service from both the life offices and lenders. While 2022 has seen a marked improvement from the lenders, the life offices are still lagging behind.
Technology, staffing, inability to remote work, and business volumes have all been cited as the predominate causes for the lack of service. Brokers are consumer champions; we have a client base that is built up over years from loyalty and trust, we get business by referral and our reputation hangs on our service.
When we are unable to give our clients the service that we want and the service that they demand, it reflects badly on us. It does not matter to our clients that the service problem rests with life offices, bad service from life offices damages our reputation and increases the cost of doing business.
Service issues can cause irreparable damage that no amount of apologising will fix. Bad service is just not good enough!
What Brokers require from life offices is going back to basics. Minimum acceptable service for me is someone acknowledging receipt of documents, someone taking ownership of your case or your query, and someone answering the phone when I call during normal office hours.
Brokers Ireland are very aware of the impact service can have on its members. In September we set up a Service Working Group, we have sent out monthly surveys to members and have met with each of the life offices to voice our outrage at the lack of service both Brokers and their clients are getting.
I do have to caveat my comments by saying that some life offices are still doing a reasonable job and I am sure you all know who they are.
Products might have minor differences but more often than not, they are not so different that choosing one over another would disadvantage a client. Provided products recommended are in the best interest of the client, business in the main will be won on the service the client receives directly or through the Broker channel.
The Brokers Ireland’s office is also dealing with a high volume of complaints and are also making representations on individual cases and issues with the life offices. Brokers are not unsympathetic to the issues of the life offices but as one of my working group colleagues said at a recent meeting “don’t make your problem our problem”.
We have been patient for the last two years, listening to excuses and trying to manage our clients’ expectations as best as we can but we have reached breaking point. Financial Brokers are doing far more administration work on behalf of the life offices and thus reducing the cost for them.
We are now bearing the cost for printing and spending valuable time keying cases, this has increased the cost for a Financial Broker to do business. At the same time, life offices have managed to cut their costs, helped considerably by CP116 ceasing all costs incurred with entertaining Brokers and cutting their printing and data-inputting overheads at the same time we are increasing ours.
So why are the life offices not spending these savings on Service? We know that sometimes our actions as Brokers can slow down the process. Personally, I know that I make twice as many follow up calls and send twice as many emails on a case than I did pre-pandemic. This is because I am not confident of the service I am receiving from the life offices. This is not and cannot be acceptable going forward. What Brokers require from life offices is going back to basics.
Minimum acceptable service for me is someone acknowledging receipt of documents, someone taking ownership of your case or your query, and someone answering the phone when I call during normal office hours. We do not want or need fancy systems, we need human interaction with people who are knowledgeable, efficient and who we can trust to get the job done in a timely manner.
Our Broker Consultants were once the people we went to with a technical query or an unusual case. The role of the Broker Consultant is vital and appreciated by Brokers, they should be available for this purpose and not be bogged down with chasing paper. Times have changed and these days there are a lot of comparable products offered from all of the life offices.
Each company must look internally and decide ‘how can we do better’. Better still make a pledge to the Broker market, give us a service level agreement that shows that you will strive to give a good service to Brokers and our clients.
These products might have minor differences but more often than not, they are not so different that choosing one over another would disadvantage a client. Provided products recommended are in the best interest of the client, business in the main will be won on the service the client receives directly or through the Broker channel.
As an industry the life offices have let us down, they have let our clients down and it is now time for them to focus their priorities on service. Clients always reward good service, through loyalty. Each company must look internally and decide ‘how can we do better’.
Better still make a pledge to the Broker market, give us a service level agreement that shows that you will strive to give a good service to Brokers and our clients.
