Taking Care of Lapsed Policyholders

You’ll get reports every week of your policyholders who have policies who have lapsed or whose bank accounts have moved. Many of these policyholders have no idea that their policies have been canceled!

Taking care of these policyholders isn’t just good business, it’s a huge favor to them! Many of them are not just losing access to the benefits they decided to purchase, they’re losing thousands of dollars in potential return of premium!

Here’s an easy way to contact these policyholders:

Paula? Hi this is your insurance agent, Eric Hemati. I got a report today that mentioned your coverage and I wanted to call you immediately. Is this a good time to talk for five minutes?

Saying that you have a report that mentioned their coverage will get their attention immediately. They will immediately ask you what the issue is, or even more likely which insurance policies have issues, since you didn’t say specifically which company you’re with.

Well we sat down back in June and you decided to apply for a cancer and heart policy with Family Heritage – does that ring a bell?

OK cool, I noticed here that you have already built up $1100 in future cash value in the policy. Family Heritage just notified me that your policy had been terminated and you were going to lose that money. Did you get that notification too?

The key here is to have the frame that of course this must be an accident or an oversight somewhere. No one in their right mind would walk away from all the money they’ve been setting aside all these months or years. You want to let them tell you that they intended to cancel the policies (if they did).

They will react in one of two ways – either they meant to cancel the policies or they didn’t. If they didn’t, it’s really easy to set an appointment to get them either reinstated or signed back up.

If they did mean to cancel the policy, act completely bewildered and ask why.

Most of the time, it’s because they were encountering a cash-crunch or because they totally forgot that they were building up a second retirement savings. Either way, it’s not hard to set an appointment to either get them reinstated or signed back up on a lower level of coverage.

Remember, it’s a lot easier to keep a customer you’ve already won than it is to go out and find new ones. Each payment the policyholder makes either pays you more commission or reduces your account balance with Family Heritage depending on how long you’ve been here. These are the easiest calls you’ll make as an agent – again, you’re doing them a huge favor.