AIG had a SECOND big $$$ retreat planned

[Jennasis]

Apparently those __________(insert DIS inappropriate word here), actually had a second company retreat planned AFTER the $440,000 one they just took. They just cancelled the second one today. What the heck-fire are they thinking????? The first one was beyond inexcusable, but they had another in the wings?????

Who do these _________ think they are??

http://abcnews.go.com/Blotter/story?id=5994567&page=1

 

[ntsammy5]

They've canceled it - probably due to the uproar over the first one. What a bunch of bozos.

 

[eliza61]

And this is where my $700 billion is helping out.

 

[Avalon_toon]

Not saying is excusable, but I have a friend who does conference/retreat planning, and she says these things are usually booked and paid for months (like, 4-6 months) in advance. Refund policy is usually something like 50% if cancelled 90 days out, 25% if cancelled 60 days out, and so on...

So - I don't think they should have been living so high in the first place, but this might explain why they didn't cancel the first one - it was already paid for.

 

[corndog]

This is the government's fault, not AIG's. They should never have been given any of our money in the first place.

 

[Geoff_M]

As before, this is a gross misreporting of the "event". The event was for the American General insurance sub of AIG, not the part of the company that had to be bailed out. No bailout money was involved, no AIG execs were in attendance. The events were to reward top performing independent insurance agents for their high sales volumes. This was a part of their sales incentive program. Any company that has a sales force (direct or indirect) knows the power of offering sales incentives.

But "perception is reality", and so it has to be stopped even if it may have provided a benefit to American General's bottom line.

 

[olena]

The SNL Primetime special last night included a Thursday edition of Weekend Update with Seth & Amy. They did a huge RIP on AIG with one of their editions of Really???

You can watch it here. (Link is from NBC.com, so hopefully it won't be disappearing....) You have to sit through the commercial and the Really??? segment is about 2/3 of the way in. They even go off on the Feds. It was AWESOME....

 

[PatsMom]

As before, this is a gross misreporting of the "event". The event was for the American General insurance sub of AIG, not the part of the company that had to be bailed out. No bailout money was involved, no AIG execs were in attendance. The events were to reward top performing independent insurance agents for their high sales volumes. This was a part of their sales incentive program. Any company that has a sales force (direct or indirect) knows the power of offering sales incentives.

But "perception is reality", and so it has to be stopped even if it may have provided a benefit to American General's bottom line.

Geoff's post bears repeating. This type of event is pretty standard in the insurance industry. The salesforce works for commissions. The higher selling people are rewarded with events like this. It helps keep them selling the product. Anger towards the government over the bailout doesn't justify penalizing the sales people who have nothing to do with it. If they bail out and head for a company which offers better incentives, it certainly isn't going to help American General's bottom line. And since they do contribute to AIG's bottom line, it affects AIG's ability to repay the government loans.

I'm angry over a lot of things in the current economy - but American General having an event for their sales force isn't one of them.

 

[Jennasis]

I get it. My father owns an insurance company. When I was a kid, he was a sales rep for Met Life and we attended their Leaders Conference every year I can recall (my dad was gooooood!). Their trips were usually to Florida. One year it WAS the Ritz-Carlton in Naples (my family got put on the concierge floor no less!).

However, the company knew well before they announced they needed bailing out that they were tanked. They should have suspended the conference. My sisters is a sales manager for a drug company. I am fairly certain that their "leaders" retreat has been postponed. My DH works for a mortgage lender. EVERYONE in their company will not be receiving a bonus this Christmas. Neither of their two companies are looking for a government handout...they're trying to be responsible before it gets to that point.

 

[Shannon G]

Geoff's post bears repeating. This type of event is pretty standard in the insurance industry. The salesforce works for commissions. The higher selling people are rewarded with events like this. It helps keep them selling the product. Anger towards the government over the bailout doesn't justify penalizing the sales people who have nothing to do with it. If they bail out and head for a company which offers better incentives, it certainly isn't going to help American General's bottom line. And since they do contribute to AIG's bottom line, it affects AIG's ability to repay the government loans.

I'm angry over a lot of things in the current economy - but American General having an event for their sales force isn't one of them.

Have to agree with this - ALL insurance companies (and any other company with a similar type of sales force) holds these events for their top sales people. It is how they sell their products! And while there often are some top execs. in attendance, it is to provide the sales force with the opportunity to speak to them, and voice their concerns. These are an incentive for the agents out there selling the products that make the company money... cancelling them may NOT have a positive impact on the bottom line, but could actually cost the company in lost sales in the long run.

 

[Mickeyistheman]

So if this is a regular thing and had been paid for MONTHS AGO.

Does that mean that the $6000 worth of spa treatments and the $10,000 worth of food and room service was pre paid??????????

I don't think so. I understand they have these retreats but AIG was helped out before the whole $700 kazillion bailout was done.

I would think that they would not have attended this type of event because it would look quite shady.

 

[manning]

This is the government's fault, not AIG's. They should never have been given any of our money in the first place.

Let's give AIG some credit here. If they hadn't done the stupid things they did in the first place there wouldn't have been given the money in the first place.

 

[corndog]

Let's give AIG some credit here. If they hadn't done the stupid things they did in the first place there wouldn't have been given the money in the first place.

That's what the bankruptcy code is for.

 

[j&t'sdad]

"As stocks dropped sharply on Monday, President Bush urged patience with the governments's new $700 billion plan, saying 'It's going to take a while'. Of course the good news is, he's never been right."



Every now and then, SNL gets it right!!!

 

[DISUNC]

As before, this is a gross misreporting of the "event". The event was for the American General insurance sub of AIG, not the part of the company that had to be bailed out. No bailout money was involved, no AIG execs were in attendance. The events were to reward top performing independent insurance agents for their high sales volumes. This was a part of their sales incentive program. Any company that has a sales force (direct or indirect) knows the power of offering sales incentives.

But "perception is reality", and so it has to be stopped even if it may have provided a benefit to American General's bottom line.

I mentioned this on another thread, its all semantics and hair splitting.

AIG is AIG, the fact that they like to seperate the different divisions as if they are totally different entities is complete BS.
Why dont the Profitable 'sub' of AIG help out the non profitable "sub" of AIG, and stop asking for us Taxpayers to bail them out?????
Its ALL AIG as far as I am concerned.

And really with all the $ they lost, how 'Great" are their Sales Force to deserve any of this?

And whomever is running AIG these days SHOULD have know that this will be a 'Perception' NIGHTMARE and should have stopped it. But with their greedy minds thay dont even think right anymore.

The SNL Primetime special last night included a Thursday edition of Weekend Update with Seth & Amy. They did a huge RIP on AIG with one of their editions of Really???

You can watch it here. (Link is from NBC.com, so hopefully it won't be disappearing....) You have to sit through the commercial and the Really??? segment is about 2/3 of the way in. They even go off on the Feds. It was AWESOME....

 

[CTPinkPrincess]

I mentioned this on another thread, its all semantics and hair splitting.

AIG is AIG, the fact that they like to seperate the different divisions as if they are totally different entities is complete BS.
Why dont the Profitable 'sub' of AIG help out the non profitable "sub" of AIG, and stop asking for us Taxpayers to bail them out?????
Its ALL AIG as far as I am concerned.

And really with all the $ they lost, how 'Great" are their Sales Force to deserve any of this?

And whomever is running AIG these days SHOULD have know that this will be a 'Perception' NIGHTMARE and should have stopped it. But with their greedy minds thay dont even think right anymore.

It's not all semantics and hairsplitting. AIG is a holding company - the holding company is made up of various divisions, of which the life insurance is one division, the p & c insurance is another, etc. etc. The insurance divisions are regulated by the various states they do business in - by state statue they have to keep so much of their money as surplus (to pay for expected claims). The INSURANCE COMPANIES are solvent - it was the holding company that had issues with coming up with the $$ to pay for the toxic assets from the London office of the financial division. Also by state statue, the surplus could not be used to help the parent holding company.

Unfortunately, this has all started the infamous "death spiral" for AIG - all parts of it. The bailout is just slowing it a bit - I've been reading and hearing people moving their insurance from AIG - what does that do? It restricts the cash flow and causes the sale price (if that's a division that's to be sold) to go down, because now it's worth less. Thus leading to a financial downgrade, causing it to be more expensive to borrow money...and so on.

And in insurance it's part of the business to have a boondoggle such as the one AIG had to reward their top producers. Not saying it was right to have one when they did, but when it was scheduled probably a year ago no one had any idea of what was going to be happening.

 

[DISUNC]

And in insurance it's part of the business to have a boondoggle such as the one AIG had to reward their top producers. Not saying it was right to have one when they did, but when it was scheduled probably a year ago no one had any idea of what was going to be happening.

As they said on SNL, Its like going ahead with Grandmas Birthday party when she died the week before!!!!
It could have and SHOULD have been cancelled.

 

[Geoff_M]

However, the company knew well before they announced they needed bailing out that they were tanked. They should have suspended the conference. My sisters is a sales manager for a drug company. I am fairly certain that their "leaders" retreat has been postponed. My DH works for a mortgage lender. EVERYONE in their company will not be receiving a bonus this Christmas. Neither of their two companies are looking for a government handout...they're trying to be responsible before it gets to that point.

Again, you're making misrepresentations... This event wasn't a "leaders" retreat, it was to reward the sales (more sales = more profit) performance of the best independent sales agents for a given time period. This was to reward people for their direct contributions to the bottom line of American General. And again, American General is in the position of actually making money.

It's not just insurance companies that do this. Most companies with sales forces do this. When my dad worked as a sales rep for a camera company in the 70's he and my mom were rewarded with a trip to Japan. We were also the first family I knew to own a Betamax that he also won in a sales contest. When I was in another division, our sales force had an annual "sales academy" that usually took place at a golf resort for the top X sales reps in terms of percentage of sales goal achieved.

If you want to see a company's sales fall, taking away sales force incentives is a good place to start.

 

[Jennasis]

Again, you're making misrepresentations... This event wasn't a "leaders" retreat, it was to reward the sales (more sales = more profit) performance of the best independent sales agents for a given time period. This was to reward people for their direct contributions to the bottom line of American General. And again, American General is in the position of actually making money.

It's not just insurance companies that do this. Most companies with sales forces do this. When my dad worked as a sales rep for a camera company in the 70's he and my mom were rewarded with a trip to Japan. We were also the first family I knew to own a Betamax that he also won in a sales contest. When I was in another division, our sales force had an annual "sales academy" that usually took place at a golf resort for the top X sales reps in terms of percentage of sales goal achieved.

If you want to see a company's sales fall, taking away sales force incentives is a good place to start.

Did you read what I wrote? I'm going to assume you misunderstood me. For Met Life (and for my sister's company) the "LEADER'S CONFERENCE" was not for the company big wigs (though they always showed up), it was for the top sales people in the various regions. It was exaclty what you just described.

 

[Geoff_M]

Did you read what I wrote? I'm going to assume you misunderstood me. For Met Life (and for my sister's company) the "LEADER'S CONFERENCE" was not for the company big wigs (though they always showed up), it was for the top sales people in the various regions. It was exaclty what you just described.

Forgive me, but you didn't state that the "leaders" conference was for top sales people. A "leaders" conference could also be for sales management.

You also overlooking the fact that American General isn't losing money, so on what basis should they go into financial austerity mode? They are doing their jobs, making money (that paid for the event to boot), and weren't involved in the financial mess, so why should they lose their incentives? You put an unfair squeeze on them, and their top producers may likely go elsewhere. How does that benefit AIG in the long run?

What people are complaining about here is pure symbolism devoid of any meaningfulness. American General rewarding their top producers has ZERO effect on the bailout of their imploded counterparts. It may "look" bad, but for many people "looks" are only what matters.