Working at AAA Texas — Reviews by Employees

Sales Agent Position - Insurance Sales

Prepare to be a slave. Good at sales? Fine, apply. Just be prepared to be at the company's mercy for every menial task you could possibly imagine. Want help with mountains of paperwork or processing service requests for clients? Too bad. No matter how successful you are you are expected to do an alarming amount of grunt work. Not one Agent I have ever spoken with liked their job. I was moderately successful but was completely miserable amongst a host of burnt-out miserable sales agents. Do yourself a favor and LOOK ELSEWHERE for employment. Check with them again in about 10 years when they have moved into the modern business world. Systems and business practices are sub-par to say the very least.

AAA has only been present in Texas for approximately 10 years. They are serious about growth in Texas and have been hiring many in the past several months. While AAA has a great reputation for its membership for roadside assistance, etc... the problem is their insurance rates are not competitive in the marketplace.
Sales reps make commissions on both selling insurance and memberships. AAA pivots their insurance sales off memberships, however, less than 5% have insurance with AAA--an astonishing figure. To be honest, each insurance sale I've made has been a struggle, not only with finding a competitive rate to offer, but the underwriting process is quite involved, compared with previous insurance companies I've sold for.
I wished an entry had been made about this reality before I interviewed with them...

Future field sales agents, if you are considering joining AAA Texas, read all the posts below. Yes, it is a strong company, stable, and growing, even in difficult times. Your expectations? Expect not to have a base salary, you probably are told you would be making about 40k a yer in just renewals, that is not true, your average paycheck for renewals will be $1700 a month if you are an average producer (Your percentage of renewals is tied up towards your quarterly production, used to be 4%, now if you had a bad quarter, could be as low as 2%). You are hired because they need you to sell, but there will be a lot of distractions that won't help, service work will take a great amount of your time, and filling trackers on a daily basis is something you need to get used to. Yes, you would be thinking that automatic reports should be used, but the managers want you to track every single detail on a daily basis. Expect to work as a horse, to have 2 call nights per week, forget about life-work balance, get used to work Saturdays and Sundays on events, that you need to cover to get leads, 90% of the leads you get won't ever will answer your phone calls. Cold calling will be mandatory, predictive dialer sessions, and self generated leads. Don't get me wrong, if you are in an office with high traffic, or if you are a great marketer, you could be making 6 figures, but the reality, company is bringing aboard new hires every 2 o 3 months, the turnover ratio is really high, and the majority of field agents are actively looking for other opportunities. Micromanagement is something you would need to face in a daily basis, and don't be surprised that higher management on corporate level don't even know what's going on at the local offices, they probably hear from the managers that everything is great, and everybody is happy. If you are familiar with car sales, I probably would say that is really similar, you either will be making a lot of money, or you would be turning around for other job opportunities one or 2 months after your training. Most of the trainers and employees you will be dealing on your first weeks of training have been with the company for decades, so at first, you wold thing is the best company to work for. AAA Texas insurance policies are great and priced at the right price for the right customer, but finding the right customers month after month could be a challenge. Look at this like having your own business, but with no overhead..... Have you run your own business before? Then you know the challenges.... If you haven't, do your research and be well informed, be ready to feel frustrated your first month on the field if you are not familiar with Field Sales and Hunting customers day after day.

just plain sucks

This is a strong and stable company, even in times of turmoil. There is opportunity for growth if you want to put forth the appropriate effort. It is a very conservative company - while it may be a little too conservative for my own tastes, this is why the company is so strong. If you're willing to take the good with the bad, work hard toward a goal, and speak up loud and clear when you are unhappy, then this is an ideal environment for you.

The benefits are about par. This company takes care of its employees up to its responsibilty. No more, and no less.

AAA TX is a good place to work. I work on the sales team and it is alot of hard work and requires a big time commitment, but they take care of their employees and I make good money. They are expanding and opening new offices in DFW and hiring more employees. To me, in this economy, that shows how stable they are.

I worked there and this plays sucks. No respect and absolutely nothing that you can put your faith behind as everything is changing. As an added bonus if you have a good idea "the man" will be afraid to take it to his a$$master and he tells you your idea is stupid. A year later they did make some changes and they said "we did this because it was my idea and we love our employees." You are an a$$hole.

This is a fantastic company to work for! I have previously worked for AAA in another market years ago (which was also a great experience) and am very happy to be with AAA Texas now. There is a lot of career growth potential which I had previous experience with the last time I worked for the company. The pay, benefits, career growth and location are comparable or better than other companies I have worked for in the past. The work environment is professional and overall the employees are very competent. There is a lot of longevity so there is a huge benefit to learning from the knowledgeable employees and managers who are willing to coach and mentor people if they are open to it and that is still the case years later I am finding. AAA is one of the few companies that really believes in growing its own people and promoting from within. AAA Texas is also one of the only companies that I see really growing in this economy. There are many companies struggling now and over the past years I have gone through my share of watching companies lay off and close so it is wonderful to be with such a strong brand that is so recognized and appreciated by its members and in particular this employee!

AAA is a great place to work. It's truly rare to see a company expanding and growing in this economy and AAA has managed to remain a stable organization who serves the needs of it's employees and members for over 100 years. I have been pleased with the opportunities for advancement, and am proud to see the number of employees who are promoted internally.

Due to the growth, they hire a high volume of Sales employees in Texas. This is a challenging job that requires a commitment to growing our business and servicing our members. However, most of the Agents are very pleased with the lucrative compensation plan and work environment. I would highly recommend AAA Texas as a company you can have a career with and eventually retire from!

If you are looking at the Field Agent Sales opportunity be careful and get details in writing. What is happening is the HR department has a quota to fill a number of slots per year or they are placed on probation and could be fired for not producing a certain number. Because of this, you will get dishonest information about the Field Agent Sales position. The details change with each group interviewed. At one time the agents were given a base of $40,000 and commissions on what they sell. Then the base was taken away and agents were given "renewals" in which you earned 4%. At that time agents were given upwards of 1.2 million a year, which replaced the base salary. Because they are placing so many agents in offices due to very high turnover that number has cahnged several times. $800,000 to $700,000 and now $500,000 and it could take upwards of 22 months to get it. What they also do not tell you is the amount of hours you are expected to work. While being recruited you will be told two nights a week and one Saturday a month. Not true. There are always events that you are pressured to work, many on Saturday's and Sunday's. You will put in major overtime. If you have a family kiss them goodbye because you will not see them. AAA does not care about family balance at all. Even the managers are being underpaid and overworked. Many are managing two seperate locations (very counter productive) which has constant new hires, which means they are not hitting goals or making money. The environment consist of constant micro management, unrealist expectations, little regard for people. Many state how good the benefits are, which is true. The reason benefits are decent is the fact little pay out due to constant turn over (every department). AAA Texas recently capped what you can make as a Field Sales Agent, $150,000 per year. Trust me, there will be very few making it to that level. Sounds great, but it is not realistic. There are multiple responsibilities that make it difficult to achieve your goals. Phone duty time, policy service work, underwriting, pictures of risk, multiple trackers, meetings on top of meetings and plenty of other distractions. I you are told that you can get out there and sell, its not that simple. Your job is to sell, but they put so many things in front of that it is difficult to achieve. I am not a newby to sales and it is a difficult challenge. The money does not resemble the hours and stress you will have to endure. The environment is beyond negative. What is missing is truth, concern for your fellow man, and realistic expectations. If you are young 20s no personal life and want to learn as you go, this is the job for you (temporarily). There are better companies to work for that will not treat you as badly as AAA. You can read that people from multiple departments are very unhappy. Not everyone is angry, they just see it for what it really is. Know there is truth in many of the words here. I was not fired, I have no personal issue with any one person. I just want others to know what you will walk into should you make the choice. The training has improved from earlier statements, and yes they will require that if you leave before your one year anniversary that you pay them $2000. That is the exact reason many just do not show back up to work and abandon their job. If you have other options of job opportunities, go elsewhere.