Insurance Journal Forums

Hello Insurance Guys and Gal's, anyone out there know of any great agency clusters for P&C.
This would be for California

Look at SIAA.net. I've heard nothing but good about them

You might look into NIA (Networked Insurance Affialites) in Grass Valley.

I have been satisfied with Agentsecure.

I have worked with NIA before. Key is to make sure you have a good contact person who will work on your items. All submissions go to their office and then get sent out from there. Depending on the work load of the person you are assigned to .... things could get stale!

As for SIAA - I know there is a buy in of several thousands...

Thanks pita3333 and cathies, I am very aware of NIA, absolutely horrible service and quoting process, thankfully I'm not that desperate. Yes if you can find someone at NIA that's at your beckon call....to do quick quotes and changes the system works. Is this really possible day to day.
I have emailed the master agent for SIAA over two weeks ago no response ( not a good sign) and agentsecure I will check out. I believe I have found a great cluster. Thanks for everyone help...

Sandog, who is the cluster you like?

Do you know of a cluster in South Dakota?

sanddog, can you advise the cluster you are leaning towards as per your previous post?

You might wish to look at Atlantic-Pacific Insurance Brokers, Inc. -
they are located in No.California, with one Agency in So.Cal., one in Washington, rest in No.California.

If interested, give me a call at (253) 840 5137

broberts, i have been partly associated with our cluster for 6 years and i finely decide to join. I can't give out the name because were not interested with newly established agencies. I am always interested as to who's out there looking. You see a book of business is required and experience. The losses and poor business submissions could kill are bounces and appointments. That's one reason why we don't want agencies who chase sub-standard business. I would check in with PIA cluster their OK for CA

broberts, . Opps and one Valley United, i don't think their for you To join $10,000 to $1400 per month need $2,000,000 in writen premium if that's you call them or i can hook you up with my cluster. I think PIA cluster is a better bet for you new guys, their OK for CA

For some of us learning the insurance terminology could you please descirbe what a cluster is?

Yes a collective group of agencies are gather together to join as one very powerful buying group. Generally, commission are paid to each agent 100% and bounces as well. Some agencies pay a percentage to the main service center some agency pay a monthly due. You must have service center to handle carriers changes up dated and commission and so on

I have looked and been approached by both SAII, and ISU.

I concluded that the SAII was not a good solution for our agency. However for a new or small agency their solution is not too bad. I think the advantages for a smaller agency outweigh the disadvantages.
You do have to give up a percentage of ownership, and give them the 1st right of refusal, in the event of a need or desire to sell your agency.
I helped a small agency get setup with SAII, and they have been very happy with the arrangement.

We are a small to medium agency in our state, and giving up some ownership & the right of first refusal was not attractive to me.

Also they did not address how bonus's would be shared. They do share, but did not show us how the split was made.


Then we were approached by ISU, out of Calif. This was a much more clear cut approach, and I found it to be very attractive. It was less cumbersome than SAII. However, in our present operation, it was not atttractive. For this work or pay for itself, an agency has to be producing a large amount of new business, which can be hard to do in a rural state such as ours. In an urban market, their approach is very attractive, for the markets.

We finally found a small cluster that had been up and running for several years. It is much looser in its operations, but is still able to provide good proven markets for us. And we were able to provide help with markets for them.... which should help us look better to our companies.

Those are the pros & cons that we looked at.......