Have you ever thought about the best way to buy products or services that require a great deal of training and expertise to fully comprehend? Given that most people do not invest the time, energy and effort to become “stewards” of programs like financial services 
or insurance, they rely heavily on advice from those within these respective industries to provide advice on what programs best meet their needs. Can someone making a commission on the products or services they are selling you truly have your best interest in mind?
Over 30 years ago, many in the financial services industry began gravitating toward a Fee-Only model:
with a fiduciary responsibility to act in their clients’ best interest. -Forbes.com ‘Fee-Only Financial Planner: What’s the Difference’
In 1983, the National Association of Personal Financial Advisors was developed to certify financial planners as truly being “Fee-Only.”
What can be confusing to many is the introduction of a “Fee-Based” approach from many financial advisors and insurance agents. As stated by a financial services firm:
The fee-only model is in contrast to the more common compensation structure in our industry, which relies either partially or entirely on commissions. Under this structure, advisory firms receive compensation for selling certain insurance contracts or recommending certain mutual funds or other investment vehicles. Recently, some firms operating under this type of model have begun marketing themselves as “fee-based,” which is meant to indicate that at least some of their compensation comes from clients, in addition to commissions. Those firms calling themselves “fee-based” thus aim to differentiate themselves from those who are entirely commission-based, but we believe a fee structure based even partially on commissions cannot offer clients the assurance they need that they are receiving fully unbiased advice. raubbrock.com
Interesting enough, this fee-only model is not yet popular in the corporate insurance industry. The traditional insurance consulting model has changed very little, though, some larger insurance agencies have taken on the fee-based insurance consulting approach.
With this in mind nearly 6 years ago, KBIC insurance consulting was developed with a goal of providing conflict-free advice on how to best buy, structure, implement, and administer corporate insurance programs:
Next to payroll, corporate insurance is the largest expense for most small and mid-sized companies. I thought, ‘if I could find business leaders that struggle with mounting insurance expenses and the time their team spends annually administering insurance to pay me a part-time wage to manage this for them, that I could deliver true results.’-Andy Kaelin, President KBIC
To date, KBIC insurance consulting has had success using the 30 year old fee-only approach the financial services industry created, and continues building strong partnerships with local companies that value objective insurance expertise, freeing their staff up to focus on core-competencies.