SPECIAL REPORT MANAGING GENERAL AGENTS
Insurers may not accept non-APEXA members after certain date It began in 2014 as the Group of Nine – five insurance carriers and four managing general agencies (MGAs) that wanted a less cumbersome, more efficient web-based answer to standardize advisor contracts and compliance. BY SUSAN YELLIN
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ow six years later the solution known as APEXA will be coming to all carriers and MGAs, as insurers insist that APEXA be the one and only solution for the entire industry. “The position the carriers have taken from all the discussions I’ve been at is that they will only contract if somebody is on APEXA,” says Phil Marsillo, president of IDC Worldsource and director of public relations for the Canadian Association of Independent Life Brokerage Agencies (CAILBA).” I’ve got letters from some of the carriers saying they are no longer contracting any advisor unless they are on APEXA.” Marsillo concedes that at one time some MGAs thought of APEXA as a passing “industry thing” and that they had no need to be on it. But the letters from the insurance carriers led many MGAs to readjust their
From the numbers I’ve seen there are about 300-400 advisors being added each week. It’s gaining traction and has been accepted by the industry. It’s happening. — Jim Virtue
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priorities and many have either got on board or are in the process of onboarding APEXA. The first companies behind APEXA — insurers Canada Life, Empire Life, Industrial Alliance, Manulife and Sun Life, as well as MGAs HUB Financial, Financial Horizons, IDC Worldsource and PPI Solutions – have added dozens of other companies since APEXA went live in August 2017. Many of those not currently on the list are set to be on in the next three to six months, adds Jim Virtue, president and COO of PPI. Last year, the Group of Nine decided that if APEXA was to be successful, the only way to allow contracts was to put a final date of Jan. 1, 2020 out to fellow MGAs, carriers and advisors. “It works best when everybody participates,” says Virtue. “From the numbers I’ve seen there are about
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300-400 advisors being added each week. It’s gaining traction and has been accepted by the industry. It’s happening.” While not everyone is on APEXA yet, some companies are starting to move. “We are very interested in APEXA and have been talking…about next steps and timeline,” said Suzzette Chapman, senior vice president of communications and human resources at ivari. Carole Taniguchi, vice president of operations at Creative Planning Financial Group, says her firm is also not yet on APEXA but “the industry has been in dire need of this for decades. I’m a huge supporter of APEXA.” APEXA was meant to bring on board some 85,000 life and health insurance advisors and corporations. It was first slated to begin in early 2016 but stakeholders said they wanted to make the project more appealing to advisors. The next launch data had been scheduled for mid-2016, but then APEXA announced it required more time to fix issues stemming from internal systems of the large insurers. While it officially began flight in 2017, there are some companies still not on the program. “It took a long time, but in fairness it’s a very big undertaking,” says Virtue. “We’ve now made substantial headway and I am convinced this is the right thing for the industry, as it will save the industry time and money. It’s going to make what was a very cumbersome, paper-based process more efficient and bring the industry into the 21st century. Once everybody is on the system it’s just going to make everyone’s life easier.” Those who don’t onboard by themselves may not be able to carry out business. “If a carrier has requested that their MGA submit new advisor contracts through APEXA by a specified date and the MGA does not want to go through APEXA, the carrier may not accept paper-submitted contracts from the MGA after a certain point,” Tonya Blackmore, CEO of APEXA said in an email. “APEXA was developed to create a standardized process for contracting and screening new advisors to uphold a high standard in providing advice to clients. As an industry solution, APEXA is the vehicle for organizations to collaborate to ensure these standards are being met.”