Verhovayak Lapja, 1944 (27. évfolyam, 1-52. szám)
1944 / Verhovay Journal
October 26, 1944 Verhovay Journal Page 7 JUVENILE ORDER PROBLEMS Nearly every iraternal organization complains about the Juvenile Order situation. Increase seems to be very slow in this department due to the high lapse rate. Sometimes we get the impression that the Verhovay is no exception. For instance, in June, 1944, we reported a decrease of 10 members in the Juvenile Order. That report gave cause to a great deal of pessimistic comments which, on the surface, seem to be justified. A study of that June report shows that we have issued 161 new membership certificates in this department and we have reinstated 93 lapsed members, which would not be s6 bad. However, these achievements were wiped out by the fact that we recorded 231 lapses. Naturally, the Juvenile Order decreases by the number of those members who are transferred to the Senior Department upon attaining the age of 16. However, in this instance, there were only 30 transfers. The rest was pure loss. We must admit that we face a serious problem here and that steps should be taken to improve the situation. WRITE THEM UP! Perhaps one of the biggest contributory causes is the fact that in many instances our branch-managers fail to write up the children of our own members. We have received . many complaints along this line and one of them will serve here as an example. A few years ago a baby was born to a couple. Both father and mother were staunch members of our organization, so much so that they immediately phoned the branch-manager and asked him to come over to write up the baby. Let us get this straight. That business was sold. The manager was not required to canvass, nor to persuade the couple. The certificate was sold by the prospect himself. All the branch-manager had to do, was to go and pick up the application. He was requested to kindly do so. Well, he wasn’t kind enough to do so. In fact, he simply forgot about the whole thing. A few weeks passed and the manager still did not put in his appearance. But the agent of a big insurance company did appear in the course of his canvassing work. For him it was a cold canvass and a hard sale, for he had to put in a lot of persuasion. But still the father and mother insisted that the child should have a Verhovay certificate. Again they phoned the manager and he again neglected the calk Not so the agent... he returned three days later but he still received a negative answer. Undaunted, he returned again and was rewarded with a sale this time. After all, the couple wanted insurance protection for the child. We owe them sincere appreciation and admiration for having waited that long. They certainly gave a shining example of faithful fraternalism. But still... they Wanted insurance. Now the agent wanted the business but the branch-manager did not. So—the agent got it. But don’t think that the story ends here, oh no. It goes on like this. A year later the second baby arrived. And the father again called the branch-manager to write up the baby. Well, you know the rest of this chapter ... the manager did not change his ways. He did not call. But the same agent did... an alert chap he was! Naturally he wrote up the second child, too. Chapter three. Two years passed and the third baby arrived. By that time there was an organizer in that town and upon hearing of the baby’s birth, he immediately made the call and without delay closed the deal. The couple was not at all resentful, in fact, they were glad that at least their third child succeeded attaining membership in the Verhovay F. I. A. Now here we have a couple that is 100% for the Verhovay. Yet two of their children were lost to our organization due to the criminal negligence of the branch-manager. Only one out of three was taken up by our association and that only through the efficiency of the organizer. NO EXCUSE FOR NEGLIGENCE ' Contrary opinions notwithstanding, our organization pays no less commission for securing a new member than does an insurance company. If it is worth an agent’s time to call three times on a prospect whom he secured by cold canvass, it should have been worth the branchmanager’s time to call once. The agent had to use every argument to secure that business which the couple itself had sold for the Verhovay. All the branch-manager would have had to do was to make one call that, counting the time of going and returning, would not have taken up more than one hour’s time. NOT ALL ARE LIKE THAT! Our organization could never report any increase at all if it had no managers of a different caliber. Fortunately, the majority has a different way of conducting the business of the branch. The credit for the amazing growth of our association goes to those branch-managers who always had their eyes on the membership of their branch and never missed a chance to secure a new member for the Verhovay. A shining example is given by the branch-manager of whom the following story is told: The H. O. of another Hungarian fraternal organization wrote to the secretary of the local branch asking him to make every attempt to boost the juvenile department of that association. Replied the secretary: '‘Sorry, but I can’t do a thing in this town. First of all because babies are seldom born and second because of the manager of the local Verhovay branch. At last a woman got into the blessed condition and now as the time of the arrival of the baby approaches, what does he do? He sits on her doorsteps waiting so that he may be the first to congratulate her and to write up her baby.” That’s the spirit, boy! As long as we have branch-managers of this order, there will be no cause for worry at the Verhovay! THERE ARE BETTER MONTHS TOO! It is due to the efforts of this type of branch-managers that the Juvenile Order monthly report showed an entirely different picture in the month of August, during the John Bencze Anniversary Contest. We noted with satisfaction that 360 new certificates were issued and an additional 82 reinstated, making a total increase of 442. We still had 186 lapses, which is altogether too high, but due to the unusually high number of new certificates issued, those lapses were compensated in favorable proportion. Anyhow, the net increase in the juvenile department was 209. The increase in the Juvenile Department also compared favorably with that of the Senior Department, where 301 certificates were issued. The Junior Order received 59 more members than the Senior Order, that is the Juvenile Order topped the Senior Order by 20%. This clearly shows that our branch-managers and oragnizers have taken up the challenge that has been offered to them by our Journal in previous analyses of the juvenile problem, and that they concentrated their efforts on securing as many new members for the Juvenile department as possible. There is no reason on earth why this trend should not continue. We firmly believe that there still are many Verhovay families WAITING for the branch manager to call... THE OTHER SIDE OF THE PICTURE There is, however, another side to this problem that has been entirely overlooked by those who got alarmed about the slow increase or occasional decrease of the Juvenile Order. Statistics is a tricky science: most people believe that a certain set of numbers reveals the absolute truth, whereas the fact is that even figures will mislead if they are not correctly and intelligently grouped. Those who tails gloomily about the dark future of fraternal organizations, compare the membership of the Juvenile Order— which was 12,416 as of August 31, 1944—with that of the Senior Order—which was 39,339 on the same date. Comparing these two figures they heave a heavy sigh and say: “What will become of the Verhovay if we cannot compensate our losses in the Senior Department by corresponding increase in the Juvenile Department?” Obviously, they believe that the figures should read the other way around putting the membership of the Juvenile Order way above that of the Senior Order. Now here we have a typical case of misapplied and misinterpreted statistics, because the membership of the organization is ILLOGICALLY separated in two groups, the Senior and the Juvenile Order. Illogically, we say, because in the Juvenile Department there are represented 16 age-groups while in the Senior Order we find more than sixty age-groups. The Juvenile Order has members in the ages between 1 and 16, while the Senior Order has members whose ages vary from 16 to 76 and even more. Naturally, the Juvenile Order cannot compete with the Senior Order since the size of its market is only %th as large as that of the Senior Order. We have in these two orders two entirely DIFFERENT groups before us. Obviously there are many more people whose ages are between 16 and 60 (the last insurable age) than there are between 1 and 16. For this reason we cannot compare the two departments and we cannot expect the much smaller group to compete with the Goliath of the Senior Order. The separation of the two Orders at the age of 16 is illogical also because of the fact that no boy who has passed his 16 th birthday can be considered an adult. He is transferred to the Senior, or Adult, Department, but for all we know, he still remains a mere boy , one who rightly should belong to the group which consists of “juveniles”. For insurance purposes one does not cease to be young at the age of 16, on the contrary! A young man of twenty or a man of 25 is still young, and if the members of the Senior Department are recruited mostly from among prospects in these ages then the Senior Department has a very favorable outlook as far as mortality and similar factors are concerned. In this respect the Verhovay has an excellent record as we proceed to show. YOUNGER AGE GROUPS WELL REPRESENTED In order to be accurate, we will go back to December 31, 1943, and use the figures as they appear in the Actuary’s Annual Statement. At that time the Juvenile Department had 11,990 members in the 16 age groups from age 1 to age 16. That was 22% of the total membership of the organization. Now if we split the Senior Department into age-groups, we find that we have the highest number of members in the 11 age-groups from age 16 to 27. Please note that we figure 5 age-groups less than there are in the Juvenile Department, yet in these 11 age-groups we had a total of 13,502 members, that is, more than 25% of our entire membership. We have members with us who are 75 years of age and more. The age-groups from 16 to 27 represent about l/7th of the total of age-groups that are represented in the membership of the Association, yet l/4th of the entire membership belongs to this group. Now, from the insurance point of view, any man up to the age of 27 and over is considered an excellent risk, i. e. A YOUNG MAN. Why did we pick exactly 11 age-groups, that is, members whose ages vary between 16 and 27? Because beginning with the age of 27 the number of members decreases with every age group. At that time we had 1427 members of age 16 ... the highest number in any age-group. From age 27 this number decreases up to the age of 40, in which we had only 388 members. From the age of 40 up to 55 the number of members in each agegroup increases again until at the age of 55 it attains the number of 995. From the age of 55 the number of our members decreases again with every agegroup. Not even members who have attained the age of 55 can be considered “old” ... after all, we write them up until the age of 60. Nevertheless it is not as favorable an age as is 16. We may feel reassured if we realize that we have 33% less members in the age of 55 than we have in the group cd the 16 year old members. Some associations have a great number of old members. We have no reason to worry on this score. We had altogether 612 members above the age of 70—a little more than 1% of the- total membership—and we had 4,543 members above the age of 60, that is 9% of the total membership. How does this compare with the fact that the Juvenile Order contained 22% of the total membership? Favorably? Certainly! Let us put it this way: WE HAD MORE THAN TWICE AS MANY MEMBERS IN THE FIRST 16 AGE GROUPS THAN IN THE LAST 16 AGE-GROUPS. MORE THAN ONE-HALF OF OUR MEMBERSHIP IS UNDER THE AGE OF 28 WHILE LESS THAN HALF OF OUR MEMBERSHIP BELONGS TO THE REMAINING 50-ODD AGEGROUPS BETWEEN THE AGES OF 28 AND 78 OR 80. NO CAUSE FOR ALARM Obviously there is no reason at all to be unduly worried or alarmed concerning the juvenile situation in the Verhovay F. I. A. As long as the great majority of our members belongs to the younger age-brackets, we have no reason to study the situation of the Juvenile Department with fear for the future. The alarm is the result only of the fact that the membership is grouped unequally and the names of the two groups create the wrong impression that the “Senior” Order consists entirely of old men. It does not- The Verhovay youth is very strong in number and will remain the back-bone of our organization. HOW ABOUT THE LAPSES? No situation is as good as to leave no room for improvement. Though there is no cause for undue alarm in regard to the Juvenile Order, nevertheless, the high number of lapses remains a challenge which should and can be met. One of the chief causes of lapses is wrong selling. There was altogether too much selling of Juvenile Term Certificates and now we are reaping the fruits of it in the high number of lapses. Term certificates become null and void as soon as the member attains the age of 16. This necessitates another sale which may or may not succeed. Had the manager sold an ordinary certificate in the first place, there would be no need for the awkward re-sale. There is another factor in connection with term certificates. The parents invest very little money in a term certificate, there fore it makes little difference to them if they give it up. Studying the lapses we find that most lapses occur in the Term-Certificate—Classes A and B, while very few H-J or C-J certificates are ever lapsed. The reason is obvious: H-J and C-J certificates are endowment certificates and they represent a substantial investment which the parents of the member are disinclined to give up, once the first year’s dues have been paid. Term policies are no insurance proposition. They are intended to assist those who cannot afford to spend more for the protection of their children. But it is a mistake to sell a well-to-do father a term certificate on the life of his children. It will inevitably result in a lapse. CONSTRUCTIVE SUGGESTIONS This article has turned out too long anyhow and so we are not offering any suggestions at this time, especially because we are offering suggestions and planning drives continually in and through our Journal. In the May 25th (Continued on Page >>
