Since, as an commercial insurance buyer, you are destined to experience one or more of these interviews, here's a bit of counsel to help minimize your suffering, and save you valuable time. When you follow these procedures, the need for traditional sales interview is largely negated. The earlier you take control of your renewal cycle, the easier your job is. When renewals are properly managed, such meetings become more celebrations of a job already well done over the phone, email, and fax machine, rather than a high-pressure last-minute negotiation session.
When a broker calls to announce a quotation is ready for delivery and asks to schedule a meeting, consider the following response in lieu of what you might normally say:
"Great. Thank you. Please (email/fax/mail) me the proposal so I have time to absorb it in preparation for your visit."
If you make that your standard response, brokers will come to expect you want information transmitted in advance. Getting quotes in advance protects you from being unduly manipulated by sales tactics. It does so because it helps to separate the commodity of insurance policies (the quotes, and their associated quality and pricing factors) from the professional relationship you have with your broker (the meeting, your broker relationship, the servicing of your account, etc.).
Insisting on getting proposals sent to you in advance, and even asking the broker to include an agenda for the meeting, will do you a great deal of good. You will have time to understand your options and prepare your questions. The meetings will be more professional and productive. Sometimes a quote is very disappointing. If you get it in advance, you can cancel the meeting and save yourself a lot of time and aggravation.
I like the idea of thinking of insurance as a commodity, while recognizing the need to separately purchase professional advice from qualified commercial insurance brokers. If your broker is getting paid by commissions, be aware of the conflict of interest this creates.
