Is that really advice?

The starting point when we meet with clients is often as simple as ‘they answered all my questions’. Which is great, functional and testable. When we look at the questions most people ask in the process of getting insurance advice, they can generally be answered by facts. If there is advice to be given, you will have to drive the advice process – pretty much explaining both the questions and answers.

Another consumer view of advice is that they are very grateful for your help to navigate complex processes: difficult forms, additional requirements, scheduling medical tests and so on. Most of this isn’t advice. Although, sometimes you need to give advice in special situations arising from the underwriting process – but most of this is, frankly, admin.

This is where we begin to step in the grey area between processes which are obviously not advice, to those which can be, or not, depending on how they are handled.

Helping the customer to choose ‘how much’ and ‘which options’ in the insurance package are both activities that are, more often than not, advice. Although some exceptions exist: some websites have calculators which are outside the advice process.