The importance of the agent in selling long term care and the "critical" importance of producer training were two points raised during discussions of long term care insurance during the winter meeting of the National Association of Insurance Commissioners here.
"Producer training is really critical," said Bonnie Burns, a NAIC funded consumer advocate and a representative of California Health Advocates, Scotts Valley, Calif. Burns, after more than a decade as a NAIC funded rep, discussed the issue during her last meeting before she formally retired from her NAIC position.
In remarks to regulators at the Long Term Care "B" working group and the Consumer Liaison committee, Burns described points she sees in her work with California Health Advocates. One observation, she noted to state insurance commissioners, is that "no long term care program will survive without agents. Agents won't sell if they don't understand how it benefits their clients."
And if producers who don't understand how it benefits clients sell long term care insurance, she continued, "they may be the ones that you don't want selling long term care." Those agents, Burns explained, "will sell for any commission and won't care about education."
During both NAIC sessions, producer training was discussed in the context of states' Long Term Care Partnership Programs. "If the program goes south," Burns said, "consumers won't associate it with the Partnership Program. What they will associate it with is long term care in general."
