What You Must Know When Beginning Your Public Adjuster Career
Hey everyone and welcome back to yet another blog post. Here I will tell you about the things you must know when you begin your Public Adjuster (PA) career.
As you may already know, the PA career is nothing short of exciting. However, if you don’t prepare yourself properly, things may not turn out as well as you’ve hoped for.
Needless to say, the experience and guile will come in time but you must first have a solid start before you get there. Without further ado, let’s get into the thick of it all.
Find a company to work for
As mentioned before, you need experience in order to become a great PA.
Undoubtedly, most of you will want to start your own company once you get your licenses and that’s great. Being your own boss comes with a lot of perks, there’s no point in denying that fact.
However, I personally wouldn’t recommend this course of action when you’re just starting out as PA. The main reason is that you need to learn the ropes and learn as much as you can about the industry, in general.
On your own, you have more chances of making a mistake that could cost you more than you’ve bargained for and it’s all due to the lack of experience.
Therefore, try to find a company to work for at least for a while.
For instance, here in Florida, all new PA must go through a 6 months apprenticeship. It used to be one whole year, but now it’s only 6 months and its mandatory.
For those of you who don’t need to do this and want to start your company right away; go ahead but I would recommend that you work for a company or another PA for a short while before doing so.
Find a good company for your apprenticeship
On the side note here, if you must go through an apprenticeship to get your PA’s license I strongly recommend that you actually look for one.
Don’t make the same mistake I did and settle for the first company you come across. Instead, look for a company that can teach you a lot and where you’ll gain valuable knowledge and experience.
Starting your own company
When you’re ready to start your company it’s very important to choose a proper business structure. Go for either LLC (Limited Liability Company) or a Corporation. I started an S-Corporation which was recommended to me by my accountant.
The point here is that you want to avoid getting paid as an independent contractor (IC). As you may know, we get paid in checks and you deposit those into your bank account.
As an IC your taxes for doing that will be through the roof, whereas having an LLC or S-Corp your company gets paid and you get paid by your company, which drastically reduces the taxation.
Moreover, as an IC or sole proprietor, all the liability is on the owner, whereas with LLC or S-Corp the liability to the owner is minimized.
Get a PA Bond
It’s vital that you get your bond throughout the country. I’m fairly certain that all states require it, so it’s very important to have.
It doesn’t matter with which company you get your bond as long as you have one.
Furthermore, it costs about $250 for a $10,000 bond, which isn’t much considering the benefits. Don’t forget that you have to renew it every year.
Continuing education hours
Always strive to learn more whenever you have the chance to do so.
Here in Florida, you have to complete your continuing education every two years. That’s good because there’s always something new to learn and you can hone your skills this way.
You can spread this across the two-year span or if you prefer to procrastinate you can get your credits on various websites and finish courses in a day if you need to.
Find the work
Now come the fun and tricky part.
Finding work sounds easier than it is but it’s also not as bad as you might think.
What I did is that I called every contact I had on my phone and I urge you to try doing the same.
There might be contacts you’d rather not talk to but finding work is a difficult task and you’ll have to make some sacrifices.
Call people and tell them about what is it that you do. Try to explain that if they’re ever in need of filing a claim, you can help them get the most out of it.
Aside from that, attend networking events, join social media groups and forums, send emails and so on. In short, try whatever you can to find work.
Find a mentor
Mentoring up is essential and beneficial for new PA.
Finding someone that you can rely on for advice will help you out immensely throughout your entire career.
Having someone on-call that can answer your questions and simply be there for you means a lot. This is especially true when you’re in front of a client.
I offer mentorship advice so feel free to contact me if you need my help.
Learn to manage your income
Now that you’re working as a PA, you no can no longer rely on a steady income or salary. That is unless you work for a company that provides such perks, but I haven’t heard of such companies yet.
Therefore, you work for a commission, which means you get paid when there’s work to be had and where there’s no work, there’s no money either.
What this means is that your income will fluctuate and often.
You must manage your incomes if you want to stay on top and avoid running into financial issues.
This will go on until you become well-established as a PA and even then there will be some ups and downs you must be ready for.
The best advice I can give you is: learn how to budget and manage your incomes the best you can.
Find your passion and systematic workflow
Working as a PA means you need to find your motivation and passion. For me, my passion is helping people.
As a PA it’s my job to defend the policyholder against the insurance companies that will do everything they can to underpay, which is why they write confusing insurance policies, to begin with.
You can find your own passion wherever you can.
As for the systematic workflow, I had Excel spreadsheets and folders on my computer to keep track of cases for years. Only recently did I hire an assistant to help me out.
Find what works best for you and create a system that will allow you to organize work and perform well in the field.
That’s it guys, these are the things you must know when starting out as a PA.
If you have more questions or want to learn more, check out my other blog posts on the website or simply go to my YouTube channel and enjoy the content.
What now?
It’s time to take full control of your claims. Of your business. Of your life.
A community can help you get there faster. It can offer support during these tough times. Inspiration. Guidance.
Together, we can get you to where you want to be.
What are you waiting for?
