Educating your clients about the need for disability insurance protection should always be the first step in the DI sales process.  It's very likely that each client will need a different level of convincing that a long term disability can and will have a drastic impact on their financial well being.  

As you probably know, more physicians own disability insurance than any other occupation in terms of percentages (click here to view Market Penetration by Occupation data).  When I ask a producer who hasn't sold much DI why this is, the majority of the time the answer is, "It's because they make a lot of money."  It is true that they do indeed make a lot of money but so do many other occupations and the percentage of those occupations that own DI is much less.  Educating a physician about the need for disability protection is a much different conversation than educating a business owner or salaried employee.  Physicians deal with people who are healthy and working one day and the next day they could be too sick or hurt to work and unable to generate an income.  Physicians see disabilities all the time, hence they don't need to be educated about the need for disability protection nearly as much, sometimes not at all, as the person who is not exposed to disabilities so frequently.  As you can tell by the Market Penetration Data Sheet there are many occupations who haven't been presented disability insurance protection. 

Insurance companies try to create marketing pieces (click here for examples) and have even incorporated many statistical pieces into their proposal systems in an effort to make sure the client is educated about the need for disability protection well before the plan designs and premiums are shown in the proposal.  I encourage you to use the many resources that the DI carriers have created, but I also encourage you to have a conversation with you client rather than just go through a company sales brochure.  Make sure you ask open ended questions rather than yes or no answers and make the client understand what is at risk by circling the number on an income chart (click here for an income potential chart) rather than just telling them what their ability to produce an income is worth and show them what is resting on their income (click here for a great visual along with the traditional income blocks).

 

Many brokers ask me what is the DI EZ Application, and would this be beneficial for all of their clients?

 

Here are the highlights of the EZ App:

• No mini-exam required for total benefit amounts (base+ Social Securty+1/2 of the Future Increase rider) up to $5,001/month

   

• Mini -exam includes blood, urine, height and weight, blood pressure and pulse reading for amounts over $5,001

• For non-business owner W-2 employees:

   

• No financials required for benefit amounts up to $5,001 per month

• Business owners follow the usual financial documentation guidelines

• Physician medical records will not be ordered unless significant medical history (determined by the underwriter). The telephone interview, Script Checks and MIB will be used first.

• Medical history and lifestyle questions are asked only one time, in a telephone interview

• All this shortens the turnaround time from start to finish

So, are there circumstances when the EZ app works best? Actually, after working with this new underwriting process for some time, we found there was a group of clients who were approved and the policy mailed within 72 hours. We reviewed those applications and noted a few common commonalities, namely; the client was age 40 and younger, with no significant medical history, and an income of 100K or less. These clients did not need labs or financials; once the telephone interview was completed the application was approved.

 

Remember, if you are in front of your client and have a Traditional Disability Application with you and want to go the EZ application route, all you need to do is pull out the Life Style and Health Questionnaire pages, complete the remaining pages of the application and you have an EZ app! Please feel free to give us a call if you have any additional questions...we are here for you!