Independent broker blog: The big dilemma

Just by way of a change, I thought I’d share some of our recent customer experiences with you, these I’m sure will not be unique to Ashbourne Insurance, but it will give you an in-sight into the day-to-day trials and tribulations of an independent regional broker.

Working late one evening, I took a call from a prospective client looking for comprehensive motor insurance for his wife’s hatchback, the vehicle was valued at no more than £1000 and he’d had an on-line quote for approximately £175. He explained that he only lived around the corner and would prefer to use a local company and whilst £175 seemed a little cheap I decided, given that he was local, to try and get him a quote.

While I loaded the details onto our system and asked for more information regarding his alternative quotation, the client was checking his information on-line. After much checking and page searching, it transpired that the £175 premium included a compulsory £500 excess and a voluntary £500 excess, the client however was adamant that he had a “comprehensive” quote.

A "friend" of mine recently contacted me on my mobile to complain about the price of his motor insurance renewal. He told me that he didn’t want to have to compare our price, however that because “everybody else" was doing it, he’d gone online to check if we had provided him a competitive price and that to his horror he’d found an alternative that was less than £250 and some £100 cheaper than we had quoted.

As usual my advice was that he should be careful and check the details; class of use, policy excess, protected no claim bonus etc. However he was not at his PC and didn’t have time...so can't we just match the price in order to satisfy the needs of a loyal, long-serving customer. My response was that we would not quote him that price for his risk (a nearly new, top-of-the-range, executive saloon with business use and protected bonus) and that in my opinion the cover and service he would receive would be reflected in the price he paid. In the end he decided that “given the current financial crisis” he had to take the cheaper option.

A few weeks later the same “friend” rang me late one Sunday evening to ask for my advice regarding some difficulties he was having with his cover. He couldn’t find his paperwork and had forgotten which company he’d used, needed to make a claim and wanted some advice from me to point him in the right direction. He was most put-out when I informed him I couldn’t help.

I’ve lost count of the number of times clients call to ask for an alternative renewal quote, because they’ve had cheaper online, however they don’t know how many years bonus they have or can they re-call the exact number of accidents or motoring convictions they’ve incurred.

One client rang to ask us if we could reduce his renewal quote and confirm it in writing; he wasn’t interested in the cover and was looking for the cheapest possible option. He then went on to tell us that he’d been told that most direct insurers would beat any written quote and was hoping to find a cheaper rate elsewhere.

As I say, I’m sure that these experiences are not unique to Ashbourne and that there are those of you out there with similar stories. These highlight the difficulties we experience daily and the impact of the internet and call centres.

Anything we buy these days seem to be with a massive leap of faith and we resign ourselves to the fact that something or someone will let us down at some point somewhere during the process. If it’s cheap, it often means that the goods will be of a similar poor quality, either that or you have to wait an eternity for delivery and when it turns up, it’ll be a completely different colour to the one you ordered!

It occurs to me then that if this is how I feel, what does, “Joe public” think about our industry, the standards we set and quality of service we provide. I believe that the vast majority of insurance purchases are made by genuine people who whilst not intending to make a claim, are resigned to the fact that it will be a major problem when and if they do.

If we continue to “dumb-down” the whole experience we set the standard to which we are all measured by and rather than enhance the clients experience we will lower their expectations by de-valuing the product.

The more we chase the numbers the cheaper the price becomes, the worse the service is, the product and the whole experience. The client is then demanding an even cheaper premium to reflect the even cheaper service they endure and so the vicious circle continues.

The dilemma then for me, as for many of my other broking colleges is; how do we persuade the Great British public to pay for the added value we bring when their expectancy levels are already at an all time low?

Peter Smits is managing director of The Ashbourne Insurance Group.