Tranzact adding 240 insurance sales jobs in Tampa
Tranzact, which already employs 250 locally, partners with carriers to sell Medicare supplemental and Advantage policies as well as life insurance.

By Richard Danielson
Tampa Bay Times
Published: May 28, 2020

TAMPA — Insurance sales company Tranzact is looking to hire 240 new agents for its Tampa office, with the new hires scheduled to work from home to start.

Tranzact, which has been in Tampa for a little more than a decade, already employs about 250 people who usually work out of an office on W Waters Avenue near the Veterans Expressway.

“What’s come out of the pandemic for us has opened up a work from home option that really has allowed us to ramp up this year,” Tampa office sales director Steve Stout said this week. “For right now, everything that we’re bringing in is work from home for the foreseeable future.”

Eventually, some agents hired now will work from the sales center when it re-opens, but when that happens has not been determined, Stout said.

Founded in 1997 and purchased for $1.3 billion last year by Willis Towers Watson, a publicly traded company, Tranzact has 1,500 employees in 11 different locations.

Agents sell insurance over the phone: Medicare supplemental policies, Medicare Advantage plans and some life insurance. Tranzact doesn’t offer its own insurance products, but partners with major carriers like Mutual of Omaha, Cigna, Humana, Anthem, and Blue Cross Blue Shield to sell their products. The work does not include cold-calling, Stout said. Instead, agents work from leads that Tranzact or its partners generate.

The jobs pay $16 to $18 an hour plus commission and include benefits. The average agent might make $40,000 to $50,000 annually, Stout said, but it’s not unheard of for a top agent to make in the low six figures.

Because of the people skills involved, the company says its jobs could be a good fit for workers displaced from hospitality, tourism, retail or other service industries hit hard by the shutdowns to slow the spread of the COVID-19 virus. All of Tranzact’s insurance sales jobs require an insurance license.

“If a candidate does not currently have an insurance license or any experience selling insurance, but we think they would be a great fit for the role, we will sponsor them and guide them through an online instructor-led course to earn their insurance license,” Tranzact director of human resources, sales and operations Lindsey Gardner said in a statement.