The world without computers, the internet, smartphones, tablets and instant communication is something that not many people could imagine. We used to talk, years ago, about only younger people being able to use technology to it’s maximum. Then along came talk of silver surfer and schools started teaching kids to use computers, mice and touchpads before they were five years old.
We are now firmly at the stage where everyone can get access to most things at the touch of a button. But, the reality of online purchases is that you are still at the mercy of the postal and courier services, once you have made you purchase.
It is understandable that if one can access a website and buy a product within a few minutes, that you would expect to receive this within a few days. Things are getting better, to be fair. I remember before the dot.com bubble burst, there were many websites that sprung up selling different products, you then had to wait the usual, up to 28 days. This was not what the net was all about and after the bubble burst, businesses started to become a bit more customer savvy and realised that waiting a month is just not good enough.
In 2011 then, if you make an online purchase, then it is more than likely that you can pay a little bit extra to get this within a day or so.
When you are looking for a business insurance quote, what sort of timescales should you expect to actually get your fully compliant, written confirmed quote? On the businessinsure website, we state that we will contact you within 24 hours, if you fill out our enquiry form.
This is a real outside one, most customers are contacted within one working hour of the email being received. We say 24 hours because there can be delays in receiving communications via the server. The hour is usual and in most cases we aim to to get a confirmed quote on the same day.
As a business insurance broker, we have to offer you the best possible deal we can, from the providers we have access to. We simply cannot just quote one company all the time. So there is a process involved where we have to physically search maybe three, four or five companies. Most of the time we are at the mercy of the commercial insurance companies.