Seeking advice?

Are your customers fully aware of the additional benefits ARAG’s before-the-event legal insurance policies offer? A free legal advice helpline accessible 24/7 and manned by experts and access to a wide variety of legal document templates via the legal services website which can be downloaded at any time are two really valuable extra benefits.

With the New Year in full swing, now is the time to emphasise to your customers how these services can empower them to protect their legal rights by providing valuable guidance when help with legal issues is needed.

For business customers statistics from 2012 examining the usage of the legal services website show that the most popular group of legal document templates downloaded were related to employment (62% of downloads). These included employment agreements, documents related to employee disciplinary matters and accessing the comprehensive employee handbook. This was followed by documents related to debt recovery and behind that the health and safety category also proved popular.

For individuals and consumers one of the most popular documents to download was the free will, demonstrating the desire for many to secure their future. As with all documents, the simple step-by-step approach for the will document creation was appealing.

Landlords also utilised the service, sourcing documents ranging from tenancy agreements to Section 8 notices.

A similar pattern emerged with calls made to the legal advice helpline. In 2012, 68% of the calls made to our legal advisors related to employment matters. Other popular reasons for customers to call for legal advice related to landlord and tenant disputes, commercial issues, property-related queries and consumer matters.

These resources are incorporated into ARAG landlord, business, motor and family policies as standard which provides you with a helpful sales tool.  The value for the customer lies in helping them to manage the risk of disputes escalating and provide a cost benefit to those policyholders who do not need to make a claim under their policy. The added value to brokers is that these services create an effective retention tool when it comes to influencing policy renewal.

For more information, visit our website – www.arag.co.uk

 

A time for change... it is indeed!

The recent report - A time of change: solicitors' firms in England and Wales - published jointly by The Law Society, Legal Services Board and the Ministry of Justice examines the results of a comprehensive survey conducted with solicitors firms to provide a “benchmark of the profession”.

The report leads us to conclude that in the light of the recession, evolution of technology, changes to funding and legal aid and further challenges brought about by the LASPO Act and associated reforms -  the industry needs to adapt in order to move forward.

The report highlights a market shift where the larger specialist firms will look to grow and thrive in this environment. Yet this could be at the expense of the smaller firms who will not be able to compete without the benefits of economies of scale. In fact the report finds that “smaller and medium-sized firms are significantly more likely to have reported decreases in turnover”. One of the areas the firms will be hardest hit is in legal aid where funding is being cut right back by the government courtesy of the LASPO Act due to become law in April. The report shows that 23% of the firms included are concerned about “adapting to the changes in legal aid” and “31% of firms currently working with legal aid funded cases were considering withdrawing from one or more areas of legal aid in the next three years”.

With increasingly limited choice owing to the market shift and reduced access to justice, consumers too will suffer. Fortunately for those with BTE  legal protection an expert panel of solicitor’s firms has already been assembled by the provider. With a range of firms available according to the dispute, the customer will be well placed to protect their legal rights. At ARAG, we ensure that our panel solicitors not only have specialist subjects but are also spread far and wide across the country and we ensure service standards through our panel.

ARAG are committed to the ATE market and we are considering options for new products in light of LASPOA. Our message is that in the new legal world we will continue to support access to justice, working with panel and non-panel firms on behalf of those with BTE and supporting others along the ATE route in an environment which it appears will be less welcoming to those wishing to protect their legal rights.

Find out more about legal insurance on our website: www.arag.co.uk

Make that prospect list and then make it happen!

Now is a good time for insurance salesmen and saleswomen around the land to look down the funnel at the pipeline and see where the new business is coming from.

I have a book of existing business so the first effort is to ensure that this is retained. The problem is that you never will manage to keep all of it. Businesses close or are acquired. People move on and new people with different priorities move in. A book of business will always decline without sales input.

However, your existing book of business is also a great source of new revenue. You need to ask yourself: Do you handle all of their business? Can they recommend you to someone else? As always, diligent efforts will prove to be beneficial.

On the other hand you will also need to target a completely new set of customers to create or renew your database of prospects. Here are a first few steps:

• Define: Your area, your products and what your company wants to achieve.
• Research: Invest the time upfront to save it later down the line by building a comprehensive list of potential contacts with names, job titles, contact details and any other useful information
• Refine: Ensure that your data is clean and remove out of date information. This exercise is as good as any excuse to get in touch with people and will help you to prioritise your list.
• Verify: Does your sales manager agree with your list? Yes? Good! Let’s get on with it.

Unfortunately there is no short cut. You must make contact, you must pursue. Nobody likes it but it is just something that has to be done.

Two further thoughts:

• Don’t outsource prospecting. It doesn’t work!
• Now and then enquiries come to you. Jump on them.