Reliance Life Insurance Company (RLIC) has announced the launch of ‘Career Agency’, a new distribution format aimed at enhancing the company’s reach and footprints across the country.
This is the third new distribution channel introduced by the private life insurer this year. The earlier launched two new distribution formats were ‘Life Plaza’ and ‘Face-to-Face’.
The ‘career agency’ format offers a fixed stipend structure to prospective advisors , looking at insurance as a long-term professional career, during the training period.
With this move, RLIC has adapted to the Indian market the highly successful Sales Advisor model of Nippon Life Insurance in Japan. Nippon Life currently has 26 per cent stake in RLIC.
‘Career Agency’ is a first-of-its-kind distribution channel based on stipend and variable commission pay-out structure by any private insurer in the domestic insurance Industry, according to a RLIC statement.
Malay Ghosh, President and Executive Director, Reliance Life Insurance, announced the launch of the new distribution format today.
‘’The main aim of Career Agency distribution format is to support new recruits during the learning phase so that they can concentrate on training and learning the ropes rather than being under the pressure of generating business to earn commission from the very first instance.
We will help them devote the requisite time and effort to develop a good understanding of the industry and look at it as a long-term career option,’’ Ghosh said.
Under the new distribution channel, Reliance Life Insurance will hire 5,500 career agents across 220 branches by the end of 2012-13, with a view to expanding and strengthening its existing distribution network.
RLIC has already recruited around 2,500 career agents and deputed them in over 150 branches across the country and will hire about 3,000 career agents in the next three months.
In the career agency distribution model, the recruits called ‘sales trainees’ will be given a fixed stipend for the first six months, which is also the training period.
Once the advisor completes this training period and passes the licensing exam, he/she becomes a ‘career agent’ and moves to a variable commission-based pay-out structure.
RLIC will focus on Tier III and Tier IV cities and towns for the recruitment of prospective career agents.