GET LOCKED IN for AEP 2027: What Every Agent Should Be Doing Right Now | Insurance 360 Ep. 46

AEP doesn't start in October, it starts with the work you do today.

In this episode of Insurance 360, we cover the essential checklist every Medicare agent should complete before AEP 2027, including:

• Carrier certifications
•  Getting contracted with the right carriers
•  Organizing your book of business with BOSS CRM
•  Marketing and lead generation strategies
•  Carrier training events
•  Compliance reminders

 And more...

The agents who prepare early spend AEP helping clients, not chasing paperwork.

Subscribe to Pinnacle Financial Services for more Medicare, marketing, and agency growth strategies every week.

Transcript

Bob: Hey, everybody. Welcome to another Insurance360 AEP 2027 edition. Ugh. It's here. La, la, la, la. It's coming. It's coming, but it's here. It's s- sort of here. Anyway. I 

Rob: can't believe- Rob, there you go ... I can't believe we're, we're talking about AEP '27 already. 

Bob: Yeah, you know, you know the drill. And they, they, we say it all the time, there is no off-season anymore.

Rob: It's true. 

Bob: If you're preparing in October, you are not preparing. You, you are just, uh, setting yourself up for disaster if that's the case. 

Rob: Yeah, I [00:01:00] mean, at this point, and I, I'll tell you, I, I'm late on my, doing my certifications this year. Ugh. I haven't started any of mine, which is not like me. Normally I'm, I'm day, I'm a day one-er, but been so busy.

Bob: You're talking carrier certs. You've done AHIP? 

Rob: Oh yeah, AHIP's done. 

Bob: AHIP's done. Yeah. Everybody knows AHIP's gotta get done. Uh, all the carriers accept it. You kinda gotta get that out of the way. Similar every year? I mean, you can talk a little bit about this year. Is there some changes to the just overall flow?

Do they let you skip ahead a little bit or anything? You know- Yeah ... what, what's the feel this year? 

Rob: Um, th- they did change it this year. So, um, last year, uh, painfully, and I'm sure they got a lot of complaints, you could not skip through... So, uh, one, two, and three if you're a returning user, you just have to take the 20 question quiz.

You have to take it. Now, you don't have to pass it, you just have to take it. Uh, which- 

Bob: That's always interesting. 

Rob: Which a tip for the day, um, they, [00:02:00] about we'll say 85 to 90%, close to that, of the 50 question test at the end is from those modules. 

Bob: Okay. 

Rob: Okay? So, so what you wanna do is you wanna r- when you are done answering the questions and you submit, and they tell you all the answers that you got correct or incorrect, you're gonna wanna save that as a PDF, because then you can use that for your test.

Very simple. You right click. I don't know what you do on Apple. Sorry, Apple people. And, uh, you go to, uh, print, but we're not printing, and you're gonna change the destination to save as a PDF or Microsoft print to PDF, depends on what you have, if you don't have Adobe. And then you can actually use those, and you can search answers through a PDF.

Now, I know I do, um, you know, a lot of coaching on this, and a lot of people like to take screenshots of the questions. Now, that's cool to have in theory, except you can't search. So if you have 100 questions, 'cause there's 20 questions on each module test, it's gonna [00:03:00] take you quite some time to find the answers.

Yeah. That, 

Bob: yeah, that's, that's not very, uh, workable, how do 

Rob: you say? No, it's, it's not. No. Also, I get this all the time. Everyone loves to use AI for the answers. Now, I've seen people pass, and I've seen people fail miserably, because you gotta remember, ChatGPT doesn't really know our business. So it's gonna ask questions, and it's gonna think it's this one answer when it's another one because there's some sort of misconception there, and, and they're doing that- And it's pulling 

Bob: stuff from different places and different sources, so- God forbid it's pulling from somewhere that- 

Rob: Reddit

Bob: had, has had something wrong, right? Exactly. 

Rob: Quiz- Quizlet or whatever Yeah ... a lot of those tend to, to have people that, that like to troll people, right? Yeah, exactly. Um, but they didn't change a whole lot, but they did, uh, tone back, you couldn't skip through the, um, the, uh, PowerPoint presentation thing beforehand, right?

You had, last year you had to listen to them. So e- some slides were three minutes long. It took you literally an hour to [00:04:00] get through some of this stuff. This year they went back to what they had in prior years, it's 10 seconds to skip through for four and five, which is nice. You can actually feasibly get through things and, and get to the test, uh, without going through anything crazy.

Uh, I will say this, and this will be kinda like my final tip for AHIP. A lot of people pass really well for the first 40 questions. It's the last 10. So depending on what test you have, 'cause everyone's test is different, uh, they will pull questions from old AHIPs, from, I've seen questions as old as 2019, 2018, and those are not gonna be in any of your modules and in, in none of the study guides.

So a lot of people are crushing it the first 40 and those last 10. Now you could have 45 questions that are from your modules, and this is also where they throw in all the brand new questions from the new changes and stuff. So just be very mindful once you get to those last 10, um, you could have a toss up where maybe the only the last five are, are brand new questions or questions from other, or you could have a full [00:05:00] 10.

So you gotta be careful there when you're doing the AHIP. Yeah. 

Bob: Yeah, make sure y- make sure you're locked in, as they say, right? 

Rob: Gotta 

Bob: get 

Rob: locked 

Bob: in. Okay, get locked in. Make sure you're paying attention. I, I know we all just wanna assume AI is just correct, but we know, we know, right? You, we, we know- ... that's not the case.

So just don't, uh, assume that AI's gonna give you the right answer. 

Rob: Hey, before we keep going, Bob, if you're finding value in Insurance360, take a couple seconds and hit the like and subscribe button. It's gonna help us grow the channel, reach more insurance professionals, and guess what? We can continue to bring you conversations that help build your business.

Thanks. Wanna get back to 

Bob: it? Right, you gotta, you gotta make sure you lock in and, and pay attention to what you're doing. 

Rob: You have to. You have to because at the end of the day, you know, you only get three tries, so you know, you don't wanna be... And time is money in our world, so you don't wanna be sitting there having to take a test and it's, you know, it's got a two-hour time limit.

Bob: Yeah. You know? Especially with the, with the timing. [00:06:00] You know, we always say try and get it done early. Pa- part of it isn't that, you know, you're, you may not have difficulty getting through it, but it's time-consuming. It's everything takes time. You gotta wait for the, the stuff to go through and- Yeah ... how much time you have to spend on the practice and all these other things.

So it's really a, a time thing, so you sit down, like we said already, lock in. Focus. Get locked 

Rob: in. Focus. 

Bob: Focus. 

Rob: And I think actually Pinnacle offers a $50 discount. 

Bob: We do. We do. So on our, uh, on our website, if you go to our Medicare toolkit, there's a certification tab, and in there, there's a link to our discounted AHIP.

So feel free to utilize it, take our discount. It's the same as everybody, uh, else's as far as the test goes. You know, it's the same stuff, uh, but you'll get a discount for, for doing that, which is nice. 

Rob: Yeah. 

Bob: Might as well get a discount. 

Rob: Especially if you're not doing one of the major carriers. A lot of times, you know, you might be doing just a couple of the regional carriers, and they- Yeah

they might not offer that discount, so. 

Bob: [00:07:00] Realistically, I, I know there's a carrier or two that let you sort of skip AHIP, and they got their own stuff. It's really difficult to do that this, th- this day and age, um, especially if you're in multiple markets and- 

Rob: Yeah ... 

Bob: different states or, or whatever the case may be because the way the products are really set up, changing, new carriers coming in, y- you really do have to take the AHIP this, these days.

Or if it's one of the carriers that you're, or several carriers, maybe you wanna do the NABIP one, right? Yeah. There's, we don't wanna forget about NABIP 'cause NABIP is an alternative and pretty much has a lot of the major carriers on there now. 

Rob: They're getting 

Bob: there. Right? Yeah, they're getting there. I mean, it, it's been a couple years running, so they, they're definitely better than they were before, so that is another alternative option to AHIP.

It's tough. I think everybody's kind of used to the, the AHIP at this point in- Yeah ... in doing it, so, you know, it is, it is what it is. And then you got all the carrier stuff you have to do, which is coming out and it's, doesn't come [00:08:00] out the same time. Yeah. So we've got UnitedHealthcare out there, we've got Aetna out there, we've got, I think WellCare's out there and- 

Rob: WellCare came out this week, Clover came out this week, 

Bob: um- Yeah, and, and again, if you go to the Medicare toolkit on our, uh, website, you know, you can go to our certification tab, and you can see the instructions and the links to how to get your carrier certs done- 

Rob: Yep

Bob: for all the ones that are currently available, so you don't have to try and hunt and peck for who's available, who's not available. It's all in one spot. So get there, check all that information out. But, you know, we have seen A handful come out already. So they're available. 

Rob: Yeah. Yeah. I mean, you, you got at least probably 15-ish, maybe more, um, that have launched.

But I mean, we still don't even have dates for, for some, some of the smaller carriers. And some of those smaller regional carriers, you might not see them until late August, even early September with some of them, which is kinda crazy when you think about it. But, [00:09:00] um, you know, there's some proprietary information and things like that, and I think it's, uh, also a competitive edge when, um, you know, they're not showing that to everybody right away.

Bob: Yeah. We kn- we know there's a lot of, uh, variation in, in carrier by carrier when they're showing the stuff. The AEP first looks, for example, for 2027, they're gonna start coming out over the next month or so. Those events are happening now. So again, Pinnacle website, you can get access to that information.

Of course, once it's available carrier by carrier, it'll start to roll out, so you can see where carriers are gonna have products, what those ... start seeing what those products are gonna look like. Right now you, you may assume, "Hey, I've got the right carriers," but maybe one carrier you've been using is gonna change their products or pull out of an area, and then some other carrier's gonna come in that you're gonna need that you don't have right now.

So over the next month, six weeks, all this stuff's gonna start coming [00:10:00] together. Check it out on our website. You can always talk to team members here. Yeah. Pinnacle, we're on top of all that stuff to make sure that you have the right products for your area, because again, you don't want to wait to the last minute to try and get extra contracts done.

Rob: Yeah. 

Bob: And God forbid, you know, it's October and, "Oh, I need this company." It's not happening during AEP for the most ca- part, right? 

Rob: Oh, yeah. Yeah. And I mean, especially, I mean, they do background checks. I mean, these companies do their due diligence and, I mean, at some points, I know last year it, it, you know, it was taking, um, you know, upwards of a month.

So if you've, if you're doing this in October, I mean, that's almost half your AEP gone trying to wait for a carrier. So like, like Bob said, you, you really gotta jump on it, and, uh, I, I would do it as sooner rather than later. 

Bob: Yeah. Lock in. Get locked in. Get ready for the contracts, 

Rob: people. 

Bob: Get ready. It's c- all coming.

It's like a fire hose once it all starts coming. I, I get it, right? There's a lot of stuff, uh, so we're g- you gotta get organized and you gotta pay attention. [00:11:00] And this is also a reason that as these certs are coming out, do carrier by carrier. This way you don't have to try and do six carriers at one time.

Yeah. Like, "Hey, I gotta do my AHIP and I gotta do six carriers." N- now you're looking at what seems to be a more daunting task than, "Hey, I'm gonna do AHIP, and then I'm gonna do, start doing my carriers one at a time." And then by the time AEP comes around, you've got it all done and you didn't have to sit down and, you know, close your door for a week trying to get all this stuff done.

Rob: You can even, you know, I know l- uh, people love their ChatGPT, say, "Hey, Chat, I have these five carriers. Put together a, a l- a schedule for me to do it." Yeah, it'll make it- And here's the timing ... it'll make your calendar for you. Yeah. Great, 

Bob: great point. Great point. That's what AI's there for, to help you be more efficient with your time.

You know, let that do the stuff for you. It's like your assistant. 

Rob: Yeah. 

Bob: Really. I mean, at the end of the day, and don't forget, when we talk about contracts, you know, I- m- MedSup Don't sleep on it. [00:12:00] Make sure you got any med supps that are competitive in the area. 

Rob: Yep. 

Bob: Ancillary products like hospital indemnity, dental, vision, hearing, right?

We haven't seen new products come out yet. We don't know what they're gonna look like. Make sure you've got your standalone products available just in case. And I would say also take a look at something like short-term care. I mean, these are other things that you might take, need to take a look at, and there are carriers that have multiple products available, so talk to the Pinnacle team.

So you might only have to sign up with one company and you get a dental plan, you get a hip plan, you get a- 

Rob: Yeah ... 

Bob: short-term care plan. You don't need to pick up six different companies to grab all those products. You know, you gotta be strategic about it when you can. You know, make it a little bit easier on yourself.

Have them in your bag because when you come across that client that needs something different, you wanna be able to pull it out and do it. 

Rob: Yeah. A- and look, I mean, we talked med supps, right? The med supp market is vastly different now. I mean, you've had a lot of [00:13:00] these carriers over the past seven months, eight months, right, have massive changes to their premiums.

So a carrier you, that might have not been competitive at all might be your top carrier. So I would revisit those, take a look at what you have. Um, you, you gotta have a couple of those, and you gotta have carriers that you, you trust with their rates. You know, a lot of people go for the, the, the carrier that's got the

that you've never heard of that just came out with the lowest rates, and then in a, in two years they're out of the market. So you gotta do your due diligence. Yeah. 

Bob: You gotta be careful with that stuff, right? You gotta be smart about it. You're saving a dollar a month and you got some brand name company that you know has got a pretty stable rate history overall, somebody that just came into the market, you have no idea.

You know, God forbid you have a big rate increase and they don't have good health and, or maybe they're not in a state with one of the birthday rules or some of these other guaranteed issue opportunities. Yeah. You could find yourself in a situation where, you know, they're not gonna be able to move to a different med supp and save money.

Rob: Yeah, I mean, look, I, I mean, we've [00:14:00] seen- I, I means I saw some companies that are, have always historically begun with good rates. Uh, I won't name names, but y- you know, 16, 18% increases. 

Bob: Been pretty typical this year. 

Rob: Yeah, and, uh, you know, the, they, they have to, they have to make money back 'cause I'm, I'm sure they're getting crushed in claims and, and, and look, we get that.

So what I ... the best thing you can do is revisit those. Use our CSG, uh, tool that we have on our website, run some, some local zip codes for you or zip codes that are in the market that you, that you work in if you do, uh, telephonic enrollments, and just see what's going on 'cause the market's changed. So you might have, actually have some opportunities with different carriers that you might not have had six months ago.

Bob: Yeah. No, absolutely. So, you know, ready to sell, you wanna make sure your contracts are out of the way. Uh, you also gotta start thinking about your pre-AEP organization, you know, the, that marketing. Do you have an existing book of business you have to look at? Do you, are you using a CRM tool that allows you to [00:15:00] easily market information to have some extra automation, uh, for that book of business, right?

It, if you don't have something like that and you're working with, say, the Pinnacle team, the Boss For Agents CRM, it's free. It's got your entire book of business in there. So if you need to send out pre-AEP marketing, uh, you wanna contact your individuals beforehand, say, "Hey-" Mr. Client, I'm still your agent and I'm gonna take care of you.

AEP's gonna be re- coming around the corner. You don't have to talk to anybody else. I'm gonna help you evaluate if there's anything you need to do to change, right? Retention is really important, and you wanna start- Yeah ... that early when you talk about AEP coming around, so take a look at that existing book.

Use tools like the Boss For Agents CRM. 

Rob: Yeah, and not to mention, I mean, you know, we are constantly adding integrations, which recently, [00:16:00] RetireFlow- Boom ... is now available. It is. Um, and, you know, RetireFlow, in, in my opinion, and just having one of those Medicare surveys for October 1st is ... I mean, it's ... Last year I think, you know, I, I have a book of over 300 people, I think 70 people did it.

That was 70 less people I had to run to and check if their drugs are the same, if their pharmacies, if their doctors, if they moved, all that stuff, right? That's ... Having the ability to have a Medicare survey do a lot of that footwork for you. And look, we get it, we deal with seniors. Not everyone has an email.

They're not gonna be comfortable with it. But even if a third of your people are, that's a third of your people you don't have to run around to. 

Bob: Yeah, absolutely. Y- yeah, you gotta get your, your marketing, your tech, your, your retention. You wanna, you wanna start lining those things up now. Again, it sounds like a lot, but if you start in July doing all these things, do a little bit at a time, you'll find you're ready to go.

You won't have to wait till October trying to figure out who you're contracted with, or if you gotta start [00:17:00] reaching out to a couple hundred clients, existing clients, that are probably getting, you know, stacks of mail and correspondence and other, other things going on, um, and now they're, they're trying to get figure things out and, you know, God forbid they, they move to somebody else because you weren't making that touch early enough.

Rob: Yeah. And 

Bob: that's what you don't wanna have happen. 

Rob: Yeah, and look, it's, it's work smart, not hard, right? And having the ability to having a, a platform like a Boss For Agents CRM, having those, those, uh, automatic, uh, what is it? Agentic workflows now- Agentic ... um, and have them do that work for you and it still make it somewhat personalized, it's gonna save you a lot of time a- and money.

Bob: Yeah. And, and remember also the way the enrollment tools work. So if you're using our Connect4 Insurance from Pinnacle Financial Services, you do have an option to use either the Connecture or the Sunfire platforms through our Connect4 Insurance. Both are [00:18:00] available. W- it's really up to you which one that you like to use.

But remember, those are being driven by which carriers you are active and ready to sell those product, which means you've done those certifications. Yeah. So if October comes, you haven't gotten your contracting through, you haven't gotten your certifications done, you're starting to try and run the products for your existing clients and you're like, "Hey, I'm missing three, four or five important products on there- Yes, you are because you're not ready to sell for them, which means they're not going to show for you to show to your clients to see which is the best one for them.

So we all know pre-sale October 1st is when you can s- really start looking at this stuff and doing really product comparisons, 27 product comparisons. You wanna be locked and loaded Get locked in, Rob. 

Rob: Gotta get locked in. 

Bob: Gotta get locked in. 

Rob: That is, that, I feel like that's the key word, uh, the key phrase for today.

You gotta get locked in. And, and look, once again, [00:19:00] AI can help you do that too, man. Um, you know, you can plug and play and have it do comparisons for you if, if you really wanna dig into the nitty-gritty. I know a lot of people are, are very, uh, detail-oriented. Do not put together an Excel spreadsheet yourself.

It, it's gonna take ... And we were just talking about this the other day, right? It's like, you know, even five years ago, we'd sit there, we'd have to do comparisons, we'd be cre- it would take us hours to do, and then before you know it, they'd make a change, and, and half that stuff might even be out of date.

Absolutely. You know? So you can use AI too, to, to kinda do some of those, uh, next level, um, comparisons, and that would save you also some time, um, you know, allow you to, to market to even more new people, right? Because we don't just wanna roll over current business. We, we do wanna market and, and get new people as well.

Yeah. Grow that business. 

Bob: Yeah, exactly. And if you're an agency head, and you're not just worrying about yourself now, now you have however many agents you have, and you have to be cognizant of are they contracted with [00:20:00] all the right companies? Are they ready to sell and certified for all of the companies?

Because as an agency owner, you know in- it's inevitable, what's gonna happen is agents are gonna call and say, "Hey, I'm not seeing this. Hey, I don't have this product." And it's gonna be late in the game, and it's gonna be scrambling. So if you have our BOSS system, the nice thing about it, if you're an agency owner, it actually gives you eyes on your, um, your whole hierarchy.

So you can see the agents, are they contracted? Are they ready to sell for 2027 specifically? That's huge to be able to see that type of information beforehand so you're not scrambling. 

Rob: Yeah. 

Bob: There's enough to do, let alone you try to do a bunch of operational stuff like contracting people late in the day and getting agents set up.

Get organized early. N- now is the time to start looking at all of this stuff. Don't wait. 

Rob: Yeah, especially if you're an [00:21:00] agency owner, right? I mean, y- you gotta jump on it because there's gonna be, you're gonna have those stragglers that, that are last-minute people, right? And they're gonna do things, and then it's, "Hey, I'm, I'm running this quote.

Where's UHC?" And you're like, "Well, you didn't do your certifications. Did you do your AHIP?" And then that's a whole other conversation. So we see it all the time. 

Bob: Yeah, exactly. Exactly. And then the other thing to keep in mind, because w- and I'm seeing a lot of these, us as an organization, we always hold a lot of events, a lot of ways for agents to either come in person or even online through webinars, Zoom calls, whatever the case may be, to do a lot of trainings, to try and get some information.

So keep an eye out for not only the Pinnacle events, but a lot of the carriers will also hold events, also some in person, some Zoom calls. If these are important companies to your business, you wanna make sure you get ahead of it. Attend the in-person events. Meet your local m- managers for these companies.

Yeah. That's [00:22:00] huge to get, to get in with the local managers and get training from them, and, and there's a lot of opportunities that come with those type of relationships. So it's really important, not only attend our events, but also the carrier events. 

Rob: Yeah, I mean, the networking thing is really important.

You know, I think a lot of people think, "Oh, well, you know, these, these people are my competitors," but, i- yeah, in reality they are, but they're, they're not. It's really good in every ... The, the fact ... I'm- I've met so many agents over the years where they go, "Hey, I don't do annuities, but he does annuities," and then, you know, "He doesn't do dental, but I do dental."

And then all of a sudden you have this referral funnel, right, of different things. And, and, um, it just, it pays to not just network with your, your local people, but also, like Bob said, your local, um, you know, carrier reps because they hold a lot of power. They can help you, um, get you into different places as well, and it's just really important, that, to kinda grow your little, your little entrepreneurial business there, um, and, and, uh, be kind of a beacon in your own society.

Bob: Yeah, exactly, and we [00:23:00] put a lot of information. Again, I talk about the Pinnacle website. It's really important that if you're not already, uh, uh, registered to get information, uh, on the Pinnacle, uh, site, it's important to do that. We, we throw everything out there. We have an events page, we have certification pages, we have first look info when it first ar-

All that, we're gonna start putting it there. It's a, it's a great one-stop resource as you're preparing for AEP. 

Rob: Yeah, 

Bob: 100%. Yeah. So remember, you've got certifications They started. Start taking a look at them. Which carriers you want to contract with? Do you have your CRM managing your existing book of business?

All of these things need to be done upfront. Are you looking at training events, in person or a webinar? If you're not sure, reach out to your head of your agency, reach out to the Pinnacle team here. If you're independent, you can contact us, and we'll be glad to help you get [00:24:00] organized, making sure that you're prepared for 2027, because really now is the time if you want to have a good AEP.

There's a lot of changes. We're gonna see more changes this year. I'm sure there'll be some SARs, those service area reductions. Oh, yeah. You know. I'm sure we'll see some more non-commissionables- Uh-huh ... coming out, and we'll have to roll- It's like, you do one of these ... roll with the ... Yeah, we'll have to roll with some of those punches.

Th- those, those changes- Some 

Rob: suppressed. 

Bob: Yeah. Well- I never 

Rob: heard suppress so much in my life 

Bob: last year ... suppress, yeah, exactly. So we're gonna, again, have those types of, um, that type of information available from the team here at Pinnacle. So if you're not sure if you have the right carriers for your market, for your clients, for your footprints, you want to start looking at those things today.

Because Rob, you gotta get locked in. 

Rob: Put down your margarita, get locked in, get all your stuff done. Yep. You'll be thanking your future self, uh, you know, when you get there. Yeah. You just got to get it taken care of. 

Bob: It, it, it re- it really is. It's really impor- important. Uh, I [00:25:00] know it's still summertime, and, you know, I'm not saying don't 

Rob: take a vacation.

Oh, yeah, yeah. No, no, no. I'm not here- I'm not just saying don't have any margaritas. Yeah, 

Bob: yeah. 

Rob: I'm just saying if you have one in your hand now and you haven't started, maybe let's set it to the side, or drink it while you're doing it. I ... Look- 

Bob: Can you do the AEP by the pool? Is that, is that- I, 

Rob: I don't see why not.

Bob: Long as you break out a tablet, man. Yeah, it's like, yeah, you do it. Yeah, you gotta, you gotta figure it out. But now's the time. If you need help, reach out to the Pinnacle team. We're here. We'll keep providing that information. If you're not getting emails from us, you know, check in, uh, with your Pinnacle team member for whatever reason, if we don't have the right email on file for you or something.

Just make sure you're getting that correspondence. Make sure you're locked into our website, um, registered there so that you are able to get the information we have available. And we're here to help. So let's have a great 2027, but now is the time. Start looking at everything now. And if you need help, we're here.

Rob? Happy to 

Rob: help. 

Bob: Yeah. Cheers, sir. There you go. AEP 2027, let's go. [00:26:00] Let's go.