Insurance Agent Forum

Last September I had a meeting with a Mutual of Omaha regional manager and decided to enter their Career agent program. I thought that having a business card with a known entity would help me get in the door more often and would have more success on the life insurance side of my business.

MofO doesn't require exclusivity and gives you a package that kind of gets you to about 90% commission rates if you do some production.

After I went through the interview process I found out that the District Manager, a 30 year old, would be my manager. From day one he was exactly the kind of person you would never want to be associated with-repetitive, condescending, and a pain in the ass.

My biggest problem with life insurance is that way too many people who want insurance are uninsurable, and that trend continued with MofA in spite of promises that had been made to me about having cooperative, dedicated underwriting.

To make a long story short, I decided to pursue health insurance as my focus in January, shared that with the District manager, and told him that I would route as much of the follow on business for life and disability through MofO as I could.

I submitted several apps in the January/February timeframe and have several more in the pipeline. Much to my surprise, on March 6th, 3 days before the cutoff for payment of commissions for completed business for the first commission payment date of the month, I received a letter informing me that my contract had been terminated and that no more advances would be received until 'the debit balances in my account stabilized'. Which is a convenient way for them to say we aren't paying anything to you for the next 6 months.

So I lost a $2,000 commission payment and was given no notice or warning.

I did get a very nice birthday card from the regional General Manager the day before the cancellation letter. I thought that was a really nice touch.

So, my advice to anyone even thinking about taking this route is.....DON'T

Just get contracted through an IMO for a higher commission rate and, as long as you write the occasional app, you will always get paid. And consider other companies before the Wild Kingdom folks, they suck.