Pros
There isn't one single reason that I could offer - in good conscious - to advise anyone to sign an Independent Contractor Agreement (ICA) with this company. If, however, you lack morals, ethics, and integrity and suffer self-induced delusions of grandeur - this is the place for you!
Cons
The "cons", oh the "cons", there are many. Let’s start off with the fact that you are lied to from the rip. Not only are you being sold a bill of goods on what they really want you to do - which is run around and recruit more people by dragging them to mind-numbing meetings, you will be provided with little-to-no leadership, mentorship or guidance as it relates to what you "thought" you were going to do - which is sell life insurance. When you sit through one of their ridiculous recruiting meetings that they call an "Equis Business Overview" (EBO), if your Spidey senses are the least bit tuned to BS, they will most certainly start to tingle. After listening to 20 minutes of nonsense about "helping middle America" (which sounds vaguely like you will be volunteering on some missionary work south of the border), you are told about all the money you will make selling life insurance, and the "team" that you will be a part of that will help you do it. Well, folks, the reality is – it’s all a load of horse malarkey. You will have to kill yourself to make money on your own pen – sales speak for writing enough deals. Each person is operating as an “independent” contractor. So, there is NO team. The best you can hope for is someone who will take the time to genuinely help you. Unfortunately, that will only go so far unless the person stands to profit from it. And to a degree, that is understandable. Because in a sales role, there is only so much time, effort and energy someone would want to (or even be able to) offer without some kind of return. Otherwise, said mentor would go broke helping the gobs of people he has recruited, leaving no time for making his own sales. That said, they should lay off the team mumbo-jumbo a bit. Because when you see that most of these people are concerned with is “what’s in it for them”, the mere mention of team will make your eyes roll and your stomach turn. First off - they tell you that you will be starting at a 70% commission level. That is a lie. There are a dozen or so life insurance carriers which you will (eventually) be contracted with. And for each carrier, you will be able to offer at least a handful of insurance products (or policies) to the prospective client. Here's the kicker - each policy has its very own assigned commission percentage. That's right, the amount of commission you get paid is different for each product/policy that you sell. Of course, they don't tell you this. No, they lead you to believe that the Equis commission level applies to everything you sell. Yeah, sorry - nope. Most of these policies fall into the 30%-50% commission range. Yep - you read that correctly. You are getting paid about half of what you were told. But because ONE of the products of the entire lot is 70%, they tell you that is your commission level. It’s a nifty little sales trick - only to be used by the slimiest of the slimy. And guess who gets the difference, and then some. You got it – your trusty “upline managers”. But you might think, well, it would become obvious very soon. Not really. They recently invoked a new Equis policy whereby new agents (newbies, greenies, etc) who have no idea what they are doing, are only allowed to contract with three carriers, until they sell a certain amount. This serves them two fold, and does little for the new agent, despite what they tell them. They tell the newbies that it keeps things simple for them to not get confused by all the nuances of the policies and fall into the classic – “paralysis of analysis” – and become productive more quickly. Well, I'll give you one guess which ones those are. Yep - the ones with the most popular products that are set closest to 70%. This way, once all the other math is done, subtracting 25% of the advanced commission - which is normal for the industry, as you are only given an advance of 9 months (of a total of 12 months of payments) of an annualized premium of the policy that the client purchases. Throw in all the other expenses, such as the cost of buying their over-priced leads and your personal expenses of gas, tolls, business cards, etc - and it can easily slip by someone who is overwhelmed and intimidated by the responsibilities of their role, but yet still hopeful to make the big bucks they keep on hearing about. So, obviously they are hiding how bad of a commission schedule it is, but it also alleviates all of the “upline managers” (who know better) from having to spend any time or effort to educate and train the new agents they have brought on board. And while they will defend themselves by saying they could not possibly spend time doing such, yes they could, it would just take a lot of coordination and effort. But more than that, they don’t want to go through the hassle because they fully expect 9 out of 10 agents to fall out of the business entirely. Now, why is that? They pretty much speak of this openly, as if it is some kind of challenge for the newbies to “prove themselves”. And these “managers” will therefore argue that it’s not worth their time to train anyone to a level of proficiency otherwise. And the reason for that is they recruit anyone and everyone. If the body is warm and they have a pulse, drag them to a meeting and sign them up, and see how it all shakes out. It’s really unconscionable what they do to these poor, unsuspecting people. So, go ahead and ask - or better yet, confront them about this - and they will blabber on about the "golden opportunity" that you have been "given". Please. You have not been given anything but a complete load of crap. They don’t mind one bit telling people to sign up for the online course, take the state exam and go through all of the extra state licensing requirements, all to let the person totally flounder. Then just ask them to show you the actual commission schedule. And don’t stop asking them until they do. I will tell you this - there is nothing easy about the insurance business. First and foremost, it is a sales job. That means you need to have to possess a certain set of skills in order to be able to function well. If you do not possess those skills, and you still think you would like to be in a sales role (such as insurance) all is not lost. But you would be best served to work at a sales job where they will pour all kinds of training and actual resources into training you up properly. And that means you will probably start with some basic sales roles and move your way up to more complex and higher value ones. Otherwise, you will have to have the time and wherewithal to seek out your own training through industry gurus doing your own online research, watching YouTube videos and reading books. And that is a long and lonely process, but one that will payoff big dividends in the end. But you will need an income in the meantime. And be careful, too many gurus out there and YouTube personalities are only there to recruit you into their MLM machine and mask it with their own brand of BS. I would suggest one to spend a lot of time watching videos, reading reviews and joining industry forums and reading their reviews. Many people on those forums are seasoned professionals who have no real agenda. They can offer some great advice and insight based on their years of knowledge and experience. I don’t want you to take my word for anything you have read here. If you are still interested in going into the insurance field, or if you already are, by all means get on the insurance forums and ask around. You will see what others have to say about their experience with Equis.