Kandji vs Rippling IT for a P&C Insurance Brokerage
A producer at a commercial property and casualty brokerage works from a laptop holding client loss runs, policy documents, and applications full of sensitive financial detail. Many of those producers joined from another agency and brought their existing habits with them, from where they save files to whether they've ever had a passcode enforced on their machine at all.
Landing a consistent baseline on hardware used by people who are used to managing their own setup is as much a negotiation as it is a deployment, and it's worth walking through how a typical new producer's first two weeks would actually go under each platform.
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Week one: a new producer's laptop shows up
Under Kandji, if the brokerage is standardized on Mac, the laptop arrives pre-configured through zero-touch enrollment: the producer opens the box and it's already set up with the right restrictions and software. Under Rippling IT, the same happens on a Windows or Mac laptop, and because Rippling IT is also handling the producer's payroll and benefits setup, the device provisioning can trigger from that same new-hire record automatically.
Either way, the producer's first impression of the brokerage's operations is set in this first week. A laptop that arrives half-configured, missing the agency management system login or a needed rating tool, reads as disorganization at exactly the moment a new hire is forming their opinion of the agency.
Week two: the producer wants to install software from their old agency
This is where habits from a previous employer surface. A producer used to a certain rating tool or a personal file-sync app will try to install it on the new machine, and the platform's restrictions either block it cleanly with an explanation or, if configured poorly, generate a confusing error with no path forward. Setting expectations during onboarding, not just relying on the software block, avoids a frustrated first month.
A short conversation during onboarding about which tools are approved and why the list is restricted heads off most of this friction. Producers who understand the agency standardized on a specific rating tool for a reason are far less likely to push back than ones who hit a confusing block with no context.
The month after: settling into the actual restrictions
By the second or third week, most producers stop noticing the platform at all, which is the sign it's working. If a producer is still fighting the restrictions a month in, that's usually a signal the initial onboarding conversation about what's blocked and why didn't land, not that the platform itself is wrong for them.
What happens when that producer eventually leaves
A producer's departure is one of the higher-stakes moments in this whole process: client relationships and policy details are exactly what a departing producer might be tempted to take with them, intentionally or not. Both platforms can remotely wipe a device and revoke access the day employment ends, and Rippling IT can trigger that automatically from the same termination event it uses to stop payroll.
The brokerage-owned laptop is actually the easier part of this. The harder part is confirming the producer hasn't synced client files to a personal cloud account or forwarded emails to a personal address before the access was revoked, which a device platform alone won't catch and which is worth reviewing as a separate step in the offboarding checklist.
When a producer leaves, work through this same-day sequence:
- Revoke the producer's access to the agency management system and other brokerage accounts at the account level on the day employment ends.
- Remotely wipe the managed laptop through the platform so client loss runs and policy documents don't leave with them.
- For a personal phone running the AMS mobile app, rely on account-level revocation rather than trying to manage a device you don't own.
- Check that client files were kept in the AMS rather than saved locally, and note any gaps for the next producer's onboarding.
Producers who came from an agency with no device policy at all
Some producers, especially from smaller independent agencies, have simply never worked under any device policy before. That's not a reason to skip enforcing one, but it does mean onboarding should explain the why, not just hand over a locked-down laptop with no context, since a producer who understands the reasoning is far less likely to try to work around it.
These producers are also the ones most likely to have old client files sitting on a personal drive from their previous agency. Address that directly during onboarding rather than assuming it doesn't apply to you, since those files may carry data-handling obligations to the previous agency's clients that your brokerage doesn't want to inherit unknowingly.
Is a dedicated IT hire worth it at your producer headcount?
SHRM's 2025 benchmarking puts the median time-to-fill for a nonexecutive position at 44 days from the requisition opening to an offer accepted1, and that's before the ongoing salary. A device platform is running the same week you sign up, and for most brokerages under a few dozen producers, that timeline difference alone settles the question.
A larger brokerage with fifty or more producers across multiple offices is a different calculation, where a dedicated operations hire who owns onboarding end to end, not just device setup, starts to make more sense alongside the platform rather than instead of it.
What Good Looks Like
A well-run P&C brokerage can provision a new producer's laptop to a consistent baseline within their first day, and can revoke a departing producer's access to client and policy data the same day employment ends.
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How to Get Started
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For a brokerage hiring producers regularly, Rippling IT ties a new producer's laptop setup to the same record it uses for payroll, so provisioning starts the moment they're hired rather than after.
If producer payroll runs through Gusto, use its hire and termination events as the trigger for issuing or wiping a producer's laptop instead of a separate manual IT request.
Frequently Asked Questions
Should producer laptops be locked to only the agency management system, or allowed general web access?
General web access is usually necessary since producers research carriers, check regulatory sites, and handle email beyond the AMS itself. Locking down installed software is more realistic and more useful than restricting browsing, which would likely just push producers toward using personal devices instead.
Can we require producers to store client files only in the AMS, never locally?
You can set that expectation, and it's good practice, but it needs to be paired with software restrictions that actually make local storage inconvenient, since a policy stated in a handbook alone rarely changes habits on its own.
How do we handle a departing producer's personal phone that has the AMS mobile app installed?
Revoke their AMS access at the account level the same day employment ends, which disables the mobile app's access regardless of the phone itself. This avoids any question of managing a device you don't own.
Sources
Where we quote a benchmark, we show its source. Other figures in this guide are estimates or general guidance, so check them against your own numbers.
- Median time-to-fill, requisition open to offer accepted (SHRM 2025). SHRM 2025 Recruiting Executives Benchmarking data brief (PDF), 2025.
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