4. The Competitive Edge “ By having a partner who’s flexible and provides multiple options, you can cover the breadth of your agency’s clientele. It gives you the tools to be able to satisfy clients in different size categories who care about their employees and want to communicate effectively to them.” Brian Tarpey, president of The Tarpey Group, LLC, N.J. Distinguish Yourself… Furnish Solutions… Preserve Your Clients…
5. The Competitive Edge Don’t settle for less than the industry’s top choice 2009 Benefits Selling Readers’ Choice Awards Best consumer-driven healthcare products Best limited benefit medical product Best broker relationships Most innovative technology product (Harmony enrollment system For four years in a row, Colonial Life has been ranked #1 with brokers industry-wide in the Benefits Selling magazine Readers’ Choice Awards.
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21. Broker Commissions Company A STD Gross Commission 65.0% Enrollment Costs (70% of gross) 45.5% Net After Enrollment (30% of gross) 19.5% How much do you net from your voluntary benefits business? Example of Net Earnings
22. 1 When you compare nothing but net , you can typically earn more with us than you net with our top competitors! Higher Broker Commissions Colonial Life Can Give You HIGHER Commissions ! WHY? Because we’ve significantly raised our commission rates and we don't charge to enroll your business. Applies to new accounts with an effective date of Nov. 1, 2008, or later
Can your clients maintain a competitive benefits program and a strong bottom line? They’re looking for someone with solutions – and you want to be the person they can count on. With Colonial Life as your benefits partner, you can. Our voluntary benefits, one-to-one benefits counseling, and flexible enrollment options offer the kinds of solutions you and your clients are looking for.
Unlike many carriers today, voluntary benefits is not and never was a sideline for us. Colonial Life has been doing this for a long time –more than 70 years. We're one of the original pioneers of this market. Today, we’re a billion dollar company operating in all 50 states.
But we’re more than just another voluntary benefits carrier. What sets us apart in meeting the real needs of today’s employers is our benefits counseling and enrollment capabilities for accounts of all sizes – both for their core and voluntary benefits. And the best part? We don’t charge for these services. They are simply value added to our product offering.
How does having us as a partner help you? It gives you a competitive edge, helping you to distinguish yourself to clients, furnish proven solutions and to insulate yourself from competitors. As one of our brokers put it: “By having a partner who’s flexible and provides multiple options, you can cover the breadth of your agency’s clientele. It gives you the tools to be able to satisfy clients in different size categories who care about their employees and want to communicate effectively to them.”
We’ve been first with brokers for 4 years in a row now in the Benefits Selling magazine Readers’ Choice Awards. We won all four categories that applied to our business in 2009: Best consumer-driven health care products Best limited benefit medical product (Colonial Health AdvantageSM) Best broker relationships Most innovative technology product (Harmony® enrollment system) Previous years’ awards: 2006: Only carrier to win more than one award and recognized in 4 categories. 2007: Broke all records by winning all 5 categories we were eligible for. 2008: Recognized in 6 out of 8 categories.
Let's take a look at Colonial Life’s voluntary benefits and how they can help you and your clients. Rising health care costs put you in the role of delivering bad news to your clients every year. Their employees are feeling the pinch of greater financial exposure, while employers’ need to attract and retain quality employees more than every. Everybody is looking for solutions! If you can’t offer your clients a solution, chances are someone else will.
Our products help your clients: - Manage costs and bridge gaps in their core benefits - Provide solutions if they're moving to a high-deductible health plan - Offer a limited benefit medical plan for uninsured employees I
Employees' appetite for worksite voluntary products continues to grow. Colonial Life participation ranges between 30-55% in our benefits. Because most employees prefer to purchase their benefits at work, according to the latest LIMRA research, offering options such as medical gap coverage, income protection and life insurance helps your clients offer a more competitive benefits program without hurting their bottom line. I
Let's look at an example of how our benefits can work: Let's say your client needs to increase the deductible on his health insurance by $1,000. You can help fill that gap for employees by offering a Hospital Confinement Indemnity plan with $1,000 benefit. Your client saves almost $20,000 on his health plan, and his employees can choose to cover the increased financial exposure through convenient payroll deduction.
At Colonial Life, we don’t just offer benefits — We can provide turnkey enrollment and benefits counseling for your client’s entire benefits program if you choose – anytime, anywhere. Our traditional one-to-one enrollments offer the most employee engagement and best opportunity for decision-making support. To help educate and counsel employees on their benefit needs, we come to the worksite and spend one-to-one time with each employee. Our Call Center provides another one-to-one option for employees who can't meet face to face. We also offer the option of co-browsing with a benefits rep over the Internet. Self enrollment and group meetings offer alternative options to access employees who work remotely or are not able to meet with a benefits representative. The web-based technology that powers all of our enrollments is our simple-to-use Harmony® system, which features online and offline capabilities.
Colonial Life’s professional, trained benefit reps provide quality, consistent enrollment communications – regardless of the size of the company or the number of employees or number of states. We help ensure this quality and consistency through our customer satisfaction measure (the BQI) and through Colonial Life College, our national training program. Also our benefit reps are certified in communicating core benefits as well as voluntary benefits.
What employees don’t know and understand about their benefits can hurt your clients’ ability to attract and retain a quality workforce. Colonial Life’s thorough benefits counseling helps your clients get more return from their benefit dollars because employees will realize the total value of their job, including their “hidden paycheck.” It’s a proven fact that the more employees understand their benefits, the more they appreciate them. When our professional benefit reps step in as your partner with an enrollment, the real benefit is a stronger relationship with your clients because of happier, long-term employees and less hassle in managing benefits. vices at no direct cost
During a one-to-one session, we provide employees with information on their specific benefit choices – showing both their contribution and your client’s. Here is an example of the summary that we will provide for each employee. It shows every benefit the employee selected, all benefits that are pre-tax and all benefits that are after-tax. And, here on paper, the employee sees exactly what the employer spends on the cost of each benefit.
Here is a sample Benefits Statement, another free service we provide for the employee, designed to show the employee's “hidden paycheck.” This statement adds employer contributions for benefits and shows this as a part of the employee’s total compensation. It can provide a total overview of all benefits, including medical insurance, vision, 401k match, paid time off and retirement plans. Again on paper, employees learn the true dollar value of their benefits and gain appreciation for what your clients provide. An individual election form completes the process by providing employees and employers with a clear summary of employees’ enrollment decisions.
With our Section 125 services, Colonial Life can help your clients enhance their employee benefits package while reducing the tax burden for both the employer and the employee. Colonial Life has strategic alliances with two industry leaders in Section 125 administration – Ceridian and Ameriflex. Through these alliances, we offer free Premium Only Plans (POPs) and discounted Flexible Spending Accounts (FSAs). These alliances can also help ensure your clients understand their options, have access to their plan document and stay in compliance.
Colonial Life’s goal is to make doing business with us as easy as possible, saving you and your clients valuable time and energy. Any company can say they offer great service. At Colonial Life, we go to great lengths to make sure of it – independent LIMRA surveys, internal measures, customer research. And we publish the results – for all of our customers to see.
Colonial Life also offers services and benefits specifically for our brokers. Since the majority of our business is generated through brokers, we do everything we can to ensure a strong, profitable and long-term relationship. With us, you benefit from: - A means to fund core enrollments and benefits counseling services - No hassle... (...we get it) - Commitment to honoring Broker of Record (BOR) letters and your client relationships
- Broker website with a business tracking system and account search tool - Free CCH HRAnswersNow access for you AND your clients - A dedicated Broker Service Center - And marketing and enrollment materials - Hardcoded commissions - An additional revenue stream
In 2008, Colonial Life substantially raised our broker commissions. When you compare what you net with other carriers to what you net with us, you’ll see that we now have some of the most competitive rates in the industry. What do we mean by “net”? Are you using more than one company for voluntary benefit offerings and enrollment? How much of your gross commission is going toward funding those services? Are you ever billed for additional expenses after the enrollment ends? What value-added services are your clients getting at no additional charge? When comparing what you can earn with one carrier versus another, it’s important to ask yourself these questions. Your answers will help you determine not only how much you can actually earn but also how much value you’re getting for your client.
This is an example of what we mean by “net commissions.” If you’re paying up to 70 percent of your gross commission to fund enrollment, what you keep after all of your enrollment expenses is your net commission. And that includes any expenses you may be billed for after the enrollment ends! Here, you’re earning a gross commission of 65 percent on an individual disability product, but after you pay for enrollment, you’re netting 19.5 percent.
When you compare nothing but net, Colonial Life now has a higher broker compensation program on average than our top competitors – which means you could now earn more with us than our top two competitors. Why? We have made a major corporate investment into our broker compensation program and significantly increased the commission rates you can earn on our products. Plus, we don’t charge you a cent to enroll your business or to offer the many other valuable services we provide your clients. The new commission rates are available on any new accounts you write with us with a master app dated November 1, 2008, or later. And you could earn even more with our Broker Bonus! Now it's even easier to have us help you as you help your clients.
At Colonial Life, we’re committed to being a partner you can count on. We work with you as you work for your clients. With us as your voluntary benefits partner, you can deliver solutions your clients need and help your clients boost employee satisfaction and retention. Your clients need solutions to managing costs while remaining competitive, making voluntary benefits essential. Carriers are jumping into the market left and right, so why should you choose Colonial Life? It’s simple. We’re Making Benefits Count – for our broker partners, for their clients and for their clients’ employees. Let’s get started making benefits count for your clients.
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