Why should your company join IMSA?

You probably know that IMSA was established in 1996 as an industry response tomarket conduct issues in the life insurance industry. As major scandals hit the newspapers and airwaves, companies were energized to consider some key issues that, while sometimes known, were not always being addressed.

The public’s view of the industry was worrisome:

• In 1967, 79% of respondents to a survey said that the life insurance industry was "humane and understanding" in its dealings with the public; in 1994 only 45% gave that positive response.
• Over roughly the same time period, the public's perception that life companies had high ethical market standards dropped from 50% to 24%.
• From 1986 to 1994, agreement that life insurers were "honest in dealing withtheir customers" plummeted from 37% to 18%.
• Only 45% of those having contact with an agent felt the agent had genuine concern for their needs, while 49% felt too much pressure from the agents, according to a 1994 study.

Not surprisingly, these factors interacted with other market conditions to make the sales process more difficult. As class action law suits multiplied, and companies paid out billions of dollars, the trust level in the life insurance industry took a further beating. MDRT reported that four out of five agents lost sales because of ethical market conduct issues.

What are the Benefits for My Company?

1. You Can Strengthen Your Competitive Position: Let's face it. If a purchasing decision comes down to choosing between an IMSA company or a non-IMSA company, which would you buy from?

2. You Gain Credibility and Entry to Markets: IMSA member companies frequently find they get quicker entry to banking and brokerage environments thanks to the IMSA logo.

3. You Reduce the Risk of Regulatory Actions. For IMSA members, market conduct exams may be eliminated or reduced to desk review status. Some states will conduct less rigorous examinations.

4. You Strengthen Your Position With Rating Agencies. Compliance with IMSA’s code is an increasingly important element for the rating agencies. One of them has even said, "If you're not an IMSA member, we'll want to know why."

5. You Will Raise the Overall Ethical Consciousness in Your Company. Just participating in the process sends this strong message to everyone in the company: ethical market conduct is very important!

6. You Will Identify "Gaps" In Your Policies and Procedures: As you go through the assessment process, opportunities for improvement will emerge. You will be able to strengthen your procedures and eliminate potential problems before they become lawsuits.

7. You Can Cut The Number of Complaints and Sharpen Customer Focus. You will use root cause analysis to identify and eliminate policies and procedures that generate complaints. Customer satisfaction will rise; loyalty will increase.

8. You Will be Among the Industry Leaders. Who do you want to be associated with? Why not show your Board that you are among the industry leaders who support ethical market conduct?

9. You Can Strengthen Your Advertising. Use the IMSA logo to show that your company is committed to ethical market conduct. 10. You Protect Yourself and Your Company From Suits and Their Costs. To settle lawsuits, companies have spent literally billions of dollars. If you ever find your company in court, you'll want the jury to see your IMSA logo, a public commitment to ethical market conduct. Don't take the risk of ever having to explain to a jury why you chose not to seek IMSA membership.

Start your IMSA journey with our KP4IMSA© Simplified Self-Assessment Program©

To register for this program, complete the form below and click "submit." You will receive by email and/or telephone, usually within 24 hours, consulting terms and conditions from Ken Kalis.

Who's in IMSA now?

Who's In IMSA Now? 216 Companies are IMSA members now. The companies account for over 70% of the market share for both ordinary life and individual annuities. Here’s a more detailed picture of these IMSA members, as of January 1999:

• 165 are stock companies
• 36 are mutuals
• 8 are stock subsidiaries of mutual holding companies
• 2 are fraternals.

Of these, 184 are also ACLI members and 39 are in the ACLI Forum 500. All kinds of distribution systems are represented. As of the beginning of this year, 170 members used multiple distribution systems, while 41 used only one. The breakdown looks like this:

How Do Companies Become Members?

Companies must first do a private self-assessment to see if they can answer "yes" to the 24 questions from the "Elements of Compliance" section of the IMSA Assessment Handbook. Once they have done this, they call in an IMSA certified independent assessor, such as KJKC, to conduct an on-site independent assessment verifying the company's self-assessment report.

How Do I Get My Company Started?

Take a look at the list below and choose one or more of the KJKC services.

• Evaluating IMSA membership for our company
• A one-day status check to see what gaps we have
• A one-day on-site planning session on getting started
• Helping us select on independent assessor or
• Choosing KJKC as our independent assessor.

Email us your needs and we'll get back to you within a few days. If you prefer immediate action, call Ken Kalis at (352) 505-0705

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We are a leader in providing affordable, client-focused IMSA expertise by mature and reliable life insurance and annuity professionals. We'll give you excellent service and the benefit of our wide experience.

Our Pledge to You

We will always listen to you carefully, and act in your best interest. We will give you 100% of our expertise and use it to meet your needs, not our own. We will follow up every service we provide you with a feedback mechanism. We will always do our best to help your company build trust in the market place and strengthen customer relationships by helping you exceed IMSA's ethical marketing standards. We will treat you as the most important person in our business, because you are.

Kenneth J. Kalis, CLU, President

KP4 IMSA

We are pleased to have developed a simple software tool for managing the IMSA process and packaged it as an easy to use CD called KP4IMSA. . . . continue