YOU CAN HAVE IT ALL    Want happy clients and higher income? Here’s how We all know that as consumers, we want three things: fast, cheap, and good. Of course, just because you want it all doesn’t mean you can have it all. As the saying goes, you can have any two, but not all three. • You can get it fast and cheap, but it won’t be good. • You can get it fast and good, but it won’t be cheap. • You can get it cheap and good, but it won’t be fast. Have you ever considered this from the perspective of a business owner looking to build his business instead of as a consumer looking to make a purchase? Insurance agencies and producers want similar things and are trying to have them within the constraints of the traditional industry structure. Yet within this structure, they’ll find that they’re limited to choosing two of the following: Click here for the complete article …

FAST TRACK TO HELP    Assisting employers and employees with legal insurance plans When Dennis Healy’s father-in-law passed away a couple of years ago, his sister-in-law flew out to California to deal with the estate. “She had no idea what to do,” says Healy, vice president of sales at ARAG Group, a provider of legal insurance plans. “So I called our customer service line and they connected me with a local attorney where she was.” On a three-way call, the attorney explained what to do and they scheduled and held a follow-up call. “The beauty of it was, with two 15-minute phone calls, we were able to solve a problem we didn’t know how to solve,” Healy says. “When my mother-in-law needed to go into a home-health care situation, we received professional direction on the situation very quickly and it greatly reduced my family’s stress. Having quick access to experts who could help was really liberating.” Click here for the complete article …

THE THREE-LEGGED STOOL IS A BIT WOBBLY    Defined benefit pension plans are not gaining strength Remember the three-legged stool? For decades, benefits agents, brokers and retirement advisers used that simple metaphor to explain retirement savings. One leg is Social Security, one leg employer-sponsored pension plans and the final leg retirement savings using tax-incentive defined contribution plans and ordinary personal savings programs. Together, the three legs were said to support a secure retirement. The metaphor is still popular, but the latest retirement benefit research indicates that the stool has gone wobbly and at least one leg is weaker than ever before. The problems of Social Security are well known and offset somewhat by changes in the base retirement age to older than 66, but the latest problem involves corporate pension benefits. Click here for the complete article … MAKING BENEFITS CHOICES CLEAR TO EMPLOYEES    Colonial Life’s White Paper supports adherence to one-on-one counseling Voluntary benefits providers, finding themselves in the midst of a high-growth environment, could be forgiven for wanting to keep the pedal to the metal by adding products to their lineup and making greater use of online platforms for plan communication and enrollment. Consumers want more choices, and they (especially younger ones) are comfortable making those choices online, according to conventional marketing wisdom. Colonial Life issued a White Paper last December which concluded that these assumptions may need, at the least, to be tweaked a bit. Based on research by Colonial Life, its parent Unum and other industry organizations, the White Paper stated, “Employees strongly indicate they want choice in their benefits, but offering an overwhelming number of options can have a negative impact on decision making.” Click here for the complete article …  Click here to unsubscribe This message was sent by The Rough Notes Company, Inc., 11690 Technology Drive, Carmel, Indiana, 46032 1-800-428-4384