You Can Earn $28 an Hour With a Work From Home Insurance Job — Here’s How

The insurance industry is huge. There are nearly 6,000 insurance companies in the United States who sell everything from health insurance to long term care insurance to homeowners and rental insurance. All told, people bought more than $1.4 trillion worth of policies in 2021, according to Zippia.com. The companies behind those policies are always looking for new employees. Why is that good news for you? Increasingly, these new hires work from home. Read on to learn how to find the best work from home insurance jobs for you.

(And for more ways to make money work ing from home, click here and here!)

Is a work from home insurance job right for you?

One of the nicest perks to working for a large insurance company is that the market, as a whole, has plenty of experience with remote employees. Progressive Insurance, for example, has Employee Resource Groups set up that cater to work-from-home employees, helping them advance their careers. The company also provides tips to its remote employees and how to be successful working from home, including how to keep pets from being loud during calls by swapping out squeaker toys for chew sticks – brilliant idea!

Allstate Insurance, which has 55,000 global employees, also has its own remote recruiting area. This is understandable since 80 percent of its people work remotely. Visitors to the site are greeted with a video of a team member explaining what it’s like to work remotely for the company. These firms were some of the earliest adopters of the work-from-home trend — something that accelerated during the pandemic. But while many companies that went remote during that time are asking employees to come back to the office now, that’s not the case for the insurance industry, Neil Lenane, business leader, Talent Acquisition at Progressive Insurance says.

“Most, if not all of our contact center roles are remote. So that's a sales service — we even have our own in-house insurance agents — those roles are completely remote,” he explains. Progressive insurance claims roles can also be done remotely after first going through in-person training. During that time, new hires go into an office two to three days a week to learn the ropes and make connections with their peers and managers, he says. Even more traditional roles such as marketing, legal, information technology and human resources can work remotely if they want to.

What are the qualifications for work from home insurance jobs

The best insurance employees have similar personality and work characteristics, Jacob Morgan, a speaker and futurist who is also the author of Leading With Vulnerability. Two of the most important are having self-discipline and motivation.

“If you're in an office, you have a leader who can check in on you and make sure that you're doing the things that you need to be doing, you have peers, people can see you. If you're at home, and you are not the type of person who can motivate themselves and push themselves, you're probably going to struggle,” he says.

He also suggests that people who work from home in the insurance industry should also be organized, have a good grasp of technology — especially video conferencing and office software — and have good communication skills.

“You're going to be talking to a lot of people, so you should have the ability to have empathy, for example. Besides that, you obviously are going to get a lot of angry customers. Some customers might be screaming at you or cursing so you’ll need to be able to have some sort of a skill set when it comes to conflict resolution,” he says.

Lauren DeYoung, a workplace futurist for Allstate Insurance, which has 55,000 global employees — 80 percent of which work remotely — says her company’s hiring managers look for other skills, too. Collaboration is important, as is the willingness and desire to brainstorm and think outside the box. “Someone who has those core skills but also wants to build relationships, wants to make our products better for customers, make our process better for our employees — that’s someone who is going to be successful.”

Another key attribute is being bilingual or multilingual since people who can speak other languages are always needed.

What does a work-from-home insurance job entail?

Since with work from home insurance jobs you’ll be working with personally identifiable information and financial data, you may have to go through fingerprinting and a background check before you get hired. In some cases, you may also need to take a training course and pass a certification or exam.

Once you get through the company’s onboarding, you can expect to spend the bulk of your time on the phone talking to people, either internally or with customers, DeYoung says. Someone in claims will talk to customers who need to make a loss claim. This requires filling out forms, asking questions to understand what happened, doing research about the claim, and making customers feel heard and taken care of. Since the job can be tricky, Allstate claims people chat with each other virtually to get support.

Some insurance careers include sales, which requires reaching out to potential customers who are looking for pricing quotes, Progressive’s Lenane says. “You're not cold calling. Basically, customers have seen some advertisement, or they've connected online, and they need your help to either make a sale or help them service their current existing policy,” he says.

Other jobs include claims investigators, denial specialists, collections and traditional back office jobs such as human resources, billing and accounting.

How much money can I make?

The salary for insurance company jobs varies. Customer service agents can expect to earn between $17 and $21 per hour to start. Claims adjusters, who have to be licensed in most states, make a median salary of $72,000 a year. The salary for an insurance sales agent is about $28 per hour.

How to find work from home insurance jobs

You can find insurance jobs on every job posting site such as LinkedIn, Indeed, ZipRecruiter, and CareerBuilder.  In addition, you can visit insurance companies’ corporate sites if you’re interested in a specific company. Much like Allstate and Progressive, most insurance companies have dedicated career portals or dedicated sites. These resources give you a better understanding of the industry and what’s available so you can apply directly. Some examples include USAA, Berkshire Hathaway, Allianz, and MetLife.

For even more work-from-home jobs, click through the links below:

You Can Earn Up to $80,000 a Year Working From Home as a Live Chat Agent: Here’s How

Jobs Working With Animals: How to Turn Your Love for Cats and Dogs Into Extra Cash