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PTP Insurance
Agents of Naperville, IL, an independent insurance agency
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The following is a Q&A with
John Sutton, who's leading the charge on Mercury's customer service
initiative. People To People Insurance Services Inc, an appointed
independent broker for Mercury Insurance, also considers customer
service to be a top priority; and we continue to work with Mercury
to provide our clients with the best level of customer service
in the industry.
Who is John Sutton?
John Sutton, Mercury's senior vice president of customer service,
has nearly three decades of experience in the insurance industry.
Eight years ago, he joined Mercury General as the assistant to
then-CEO George Joseph and, since that time, has taken on several
non-operating roles within the company. His latest endeavor is
spearheading the company's efforts to enhance and improve its
customer service efforts - a role he takes very seriously.
How important is customer
service in this industry?
Customer loyalty is critical in the insurance industry. If companies
can provide excellent service, they will earn that loyalty. Ultimately,
if a customer is happy, they are not going to move their policy
to another company just for the sake of saving a couple of dollars.
A loyal customer believes in the promise a company makes and
knows that if they have to call on that promise, the company
will fulfill it.
Why is Mercury taking the
initiative to improve its customer service?
I truly believe that customer service is the future for Mercury.
Within the industry, we are still considered a young company,
though we have grown remarkably over the course of more than
four decades. We have spent that last several years branding
the Mercury name in the marketplace through advertising and marketing
efforts. Implementing a customer service excellence program is
the next logical step after that branding effort. We have established
who we are to the outside world and now we want to look inward
to find where we can further develop customer loyalty. When we
touch customers - throughout every point in the process - we
have opportunities to foster that loyalty. Beyond being friendly
and treating the customer well, we want to find ways to better
position ourselves to ensure the customer feels we truly resolved
their issue.
Mercury is very intent on continuing
to evolve and improve our business culture - and we understand
that those efforts can take a long time to come to fruition.
But we are looking at every single process in the company to
determine whether it needs to be done and, if so, how it can
be done better.
How does a customer service
initiative like this work its way through all areas of the company?
There are lots of policyholders that, if they have a question
or a concern, don't file a complaint or contact the company to
get more information or clarification; they just don't renew
their policy. We need to find ways to touch those 'silent' people.
At the end of the day, it's
all about the end customer. It's important that people from all
levels of the company in every department look at how things
get done. Some people at Mercury don't necessarily deal with
the customer due to the nature of their job or the department
they work in. But their actions or interactions may affect the
agents, brokers and other people that DO deal directly with the
customer. Ultimately, how you deal with another person or department
does impact the customer. The end result is that everybody has
customers, no matter what area they may work in.
Where would you like to see
this initiative be a year from now?
I would like to see our renewal percentage rates increase. The
proof of our success will really be in seeing what happens with
our retentions. I would also like to see the amount of time and
number of people 'touching' a particular claim reduced. I would
like to see us using fewer processes to get to a resolution.
If there was any one thing
you would say is important to successful customer service, what
would it be?
Getting every single employee - no matter what department they
work in or how directly or indirectly they interact with the
customer - to think about what they're doing, why they're doing
it, and take personal responsibility for the outcome. We want
everyone to go beyond just looking at the rules and, instead,
determine the right thing to do that addresses the issue and
solves the problem.
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People
to People Insurance Services Inc. - 1240 Iroquois, Naperville, IL, DuPage County - Serving Chicagoland (630) 355-2355 |
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Naperville Illinois personal and commercial independent insurance agents, PTP Insurance Agency, serves clients throughout
the metropolitan Chicagoland area which includes Cook County, DuPage County, Kane County, Kendall County and Will County;
including, but not limited to, Naperville, Bolingbrook, Plainfield, Aurora, Batavia, Barrington, Berwyn,
Bedford Park, Bloomingdale, Brookfield, Burbank, Burr Ridge, Carol Stream, Chicago, Clarendon Hills, Countryside,
Darien, Downers Grove, Elgin, Elmhurst Glen Ellyn, Glendale Heights, Hickory Hills, Hoffman Estates, LaGrange,
LaGrange Park, Lemont, Lisle, Lockport, Lombard, Lyons, Mokena, Montgomery, Oak Brook, Oswego, Romeoville,
St Charles, Schaumburg, Shorewood, Sycamore, Warrenville,West Chicago, Westmont, Woodridge and Yorkville.
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