XL-PEO Prospector'S ALLIANCE SERVICES FOR INSURANCE AGENCIES  The best time to plant a tree was 20 years ago. The second best time is now.

Insurance agencies are constantly challenged with protecting their book of business. Retaining clients and keeping them satisfied is the number one priority for many agents. But for many firms, it’s becoming increasingly difficult to manage clients and HR responsibilities effectively. Insurance agencies operate in an extremely crowded and competitive market. The need to stand out in such an environment is at an all-time high.

With these in mind, good HR management for insurance agencies is essential. Agencies rely on their staff to maximize sales and retain clients, so it’s important to ensure all human resources issues are considered.

A Professional Employer Organization (PEO) can provide comprehensive HR services, including HR compliance, payroll processing, risk management, and benefits administration. By taking on the burden of these administrative tasks, a PEO allows you to focus less on filling out paperwork, maintaining compliance, and managing employees. With XL-PEO, you’ll have more time to focus on your company’s mission and growth.

Historically, insurance agents and PEOs have been competitors because PEOs offer insurance options to their clients, which is perceived to displace the offerings of insurance agents. But this has greatly changed in recent years due to insurance agents working with a XL-PEO to provide solutions that benefit all parties. Insurance agents that work with XL-PEO find that they’re able to offer better solutions to their clients, increase client retention, and grow their book of business.

XL-PEO will not take over your business – they’ll only work with you and handle some of your employer’s responsibility. You’ll have total control over the day-to-day operations of your firm.

• Protecting Your Book of Business

As an insurance agent, satisfying existing clients and converting new leads is the key to building and maintaining a strong book of business. For most brokers, however, client retention is the key to long-term success. This is an especially difficult task when you consider the high level of competition in the insurance industry. Couple that with managing client expectations and ensuring your employees’ needs are taken care of, and you quickly see why protecting your book of business is no easy task.

When an insurance agency partners with a XL-PEO, they’re able to offer their clients a variety of options. Offering additional benefits of a XL-PEO to clients can help insurance agents differentiate themselves in a highly competitive market and persuade prospects to choose them over other insurance brokers.

A XL-PEO alleviates the burdens and complexities that surround employees and their issues, including workplace benefits and payroll. A PEO can help eliminate manual administrative processes, which can interfere with your employees’ productivity. When you partner with a XL-PEO, you can worry less about losing your book of business to providers trying to sell services and products to your clients.

• Additional Services for PEO Services for Insurance Agencies 

With the rise of PEOs and HR outsourcing, small business owners have more options to choose from than ever before. Adding a XL-PEO to your list of solutions can help you keep up with the competition. As clients look for lower health insurance costs, you can provide cheaper, more encompassing options, which can lead to even loyal clients.

Small business insurance agents, for instance, can provide perks such as complimentary benefits, voluntary benefits, and 401(k)s to small business clients through a PEO partnership. This enables them to have the same quality and quantity of benefits as much larger employers.

An insurance agent can also make PEO services part of the deal. If clients were to choose between an agent who can provide insurance options or one who can provide coverage and someone who can handle compliance, payroll, risk management, HR, and more, many clients would go for the value-add.

• Ensuring Compliance

The insurance market for agents is full of twists and turns. With ever-changing laws, regulations, and industry trends, agencies must stay alert at all times. However, staying abreast of all federal and state laws can be challenging for most small and mid-sized businesses with limited resources and HR support. Employers spend about 36 hours per week on compliance-related work, including creating new policies and tracking regulatory changes.

Trusting the HR compliance functions to a PEO makes much more sense. A PEO has more experience and bandwidth to help you be proactive and compliant with laws related to taxes, hiring, insurance claims, employee benefits, payroll, and wage claims, minimizing the threat of non-compliance. PEO services will stay up to date with regulatory changes and have a framework to deal with the changes as they arise.

• Professional HR Support

When running an insurance agency, you want to make sure you’re taking care of your employees, delivering the best products and services, and fostering a collaborative and productive work environment. With such tasks on your plate, you probably don’t have much time for HR, risk management, payroll processing, and tasks of that nature. PEOs have HR professionals who provide expert human resources services and support.

A PEO will provide ongoing PEO HR solutions, including helping you attract and retain the best insurance agents and helping them with training, employee handbooks, performance management, employee development, and more.

PEO services will also take care of payroll processing and tax remittance, ensuring your employees are paid on time and that taxes are properly processed and reported. Risk management professionals will help ensure a safe working environment for your employees and provide guidance through claims management, workers’ comp, and return-to-work processes. If you have an in-house HR team, your PEO will work with them strategically and administratively.

You don’t have to spend hours drowning in time-consuming HR tasks when you partner with Vested HR. Our PEO solutions will take care of the burdensome administrative responsibilities and paperwork so you can be more effective and productive in your business. We serve small and medium-sized insurance agencies throughout Florida and beyond. Contact us today to schedule a free consultation to learn more about how we can help you.