Exclusive life insurance leads: what you get and what to pay
Exclusive life insurance leads are enquiries from people who asked to be contacted about cover, supplied by the seller to one firm only and never shared, resold or recycled. They cost more per lead than shared or aged leads, so whether they pay comes down to two numbers you control: what a policy earns you and how many leads you turn into policies. This guide gives you a four-part test for exclusivity, typical advertised UK prices and what drives them, a calculator that turns your own figures into a maximum price, and the rules we use on Protection Connect, where you set the most you’ll pay for each enquiry and never pay more.
What are exclusive life insurance leads?
An exclusive life insurance lead is the contact details and cover needs of someone who asked to be contacted about life insurance, supplied by the seller to one firm only and not shared, resold or recycled.
US sellers market the same thing as “exclusive leads for agents”. In the UK the buyer is usually an FCA authorised firm or one of its appointed representatives, and the rules that matter are the FCA’s, UK GDPR and PECR, not US telemarketing law.
Every seller uses the word, and they don’t all mean the same thing by it. A lead that deserves an exclusive price passes four tests.
- One firm. The seller supplies the enquiry to a single firm. Not one firm per region, one per product or one at a time.
- No resale window. The seller doesn’t sell the lead again after a set period. A lead that is exclusive for 48 hours is a shared lead with a delay.
- Never recycled. The details don’t come back later as aged data, in a calling list or as a hotkey transfer to someone else.
- No sales by the seller. The seller, its call centre or a firm it partners with doesn’t also advise the customer or try to sell them cover for the same need.
Exclusivity is a promise about what the seller does with the enquiry. It is not a promise about the customer. Someone looking for life cover may also fill in a form on another website, ring their bank or ask their mortgage adviser. A genuinely exclusive lead means no other firm is calling because of that enquiry; it can’t mean nobody else is talking to them.
That distinction is the honest basis for the price. You’re paying for the only conversation that particular enquiry creates. For the head-to-head comparison with leads sold to several firms, including semi-exclusive models, see our guide to exclusive and shared leads side by side, and for the wider UK market, our complete guide to life insurance leads.
How we apply this. On Protection Connect every enquiry is delivered to one broker only, and we don’t share, resell or recycle it. You set the most you’ll pay for each enquiry, from a minimum of £35, and you never pay more. See how exclusive leads work on Protection Connect.
How do sellers stretch the word “exclusive”?
Stretched definitions are usually accurate descriptions of something narrower than the buyer assumed. The table sets out the common versions, what each can mean in practice and the question that settles it.
| What the seller says | What it can mean | Ask this |
|---|---|---|
| “Exclusive for 24 hours” (or 48, or 72) | You get it first. When the window closes it is sold to other firms or added to aged lists. | “Is each lead sold once, with no resale window? Please put any time limit in your terms.” |
| “Exclusive in your area” | You’re the only buyer in a territory. The same customer can still be sold for another product or through another channel. | “Is the lead sold once, or is it the territory that’s exclusive?” |
| “Exclusive” hotkey transfer | The live call comes to you alone, but the record may be kept, called again or sold as data later. | “What happens to the customer’s details after the transfer?” |
| Multi-partner or co-registration form | One form and one tick box cover several “partners” or “selected third parties”, each of whom may get the details. | “Show me the exact page and consent wording the customer saw.” |
| Exclusive per product | Sold once for life cover, then again for income protection, home insurance or something else. | “Is the customer’s data passed to anyone else, for any product?” |
| Exclusive, but the seller sells too | The seller’s own advisers or call centre also try to sell the customer cover, before or after you. | “Does anyone at your firm, or a firm you work with, advise or sell to the customer?” |
Each of these can be fair if it’s disclosed and priced to match. The problem is paying an exclusive price for a lead that behaves like a shared one: the customer has already had other calls, your contact rate falls and your cost per policy rises with it.
Multi-partner consent is a data protection problem as well as a commercial one. In January 2026 the ICO fined a company £105,000 for marketing emails sent using consent collected on a website that listed 361 “partner” companies with no real way to choose between them. The ICO found that consent invalid and the company’s checks on the data insufficient.
How can you tell if a lead is really exclusive?
You can’t see inside a seller’s database, so check in three places: the paperwork before you buy, the source of the enquiries, and your own call data once leads arrive.
Before you buy
- The terms say each lead is supplied to one firm only, set no time limit on that, and explain any case in which the seller may pass an enquiry to another firm.
- The seller shows you the page and consent wording the customer saw, whether your firm was named, and when the details were collected. The wording doesn’t promise contact from “partners” or several firms.
- The seller says plainly where its enquiries come from: its own websites, affiliates, social media, call centres or bought data.
- You’ve looked the seller up on the FCA Financial Services Register, so you know whether it is an authorised firm, an appointed representative or not regulated at all.
- The credit policy covers duplicates, including a customer the seller has already supplied to another firm.
- The terms say each firm’s role as a controller of the customer’s data, and how objections and erasure requests reach you.
The FCA status check matters more than it looks. Buying leads isn’t a regulated activity in itself, but a seller that asks people qualifying questions about cover may need to be authorised, or an appointed representative, to do it. Check the seller’s status yourself rather than relying on what its website says, and keep a record of what you found.
Our guide to where to buy life insurance leads in the UK turns these checks into a provider scorecard you can use on any seller.
Once leads arrive
Your own data is the best test of all. Record the answer to the question below in your CRM against the lead source, and review it each month alongside duplicates and “already sorted” outcomes.
A first-call question. “Before we start, has anyone else called you about life cover since you sent your enquiry?” It is one sentence, and over a month of calls it tells you more about a seller’s exclusivity than any sales page.
Why your own checks matter
The FCA’s final report on its pure protection market study (September 2026) describes a lead generator as a firm that obtains consumers’ contact details and passes them to other firms for a fee or a share of commission. The FCA considered making intermediaries report which lead generators they use, to help spot unnecessary switching, but decided against it and will keep monitoring switching through supervision.
Whatever a seller does, your firm is responsible for how it sources and contacts customers, so keep a record of the checks you make on each seller.
The Consumer Duty points the same way. Since 31 July 2023 firms have had to act to deliver good outcomes for retail customers and avoid foreseeable harm, and that applies to people who aren’t yet your clients. A customer who gets four calls from four firms about one enquiry has not had a good start, and how a customer came to you is part of their journey. Ask your compliance adviser or network what evidence they expect you to keep about each lead source.
How much do exclusive life insurance leads cost?
Advertised UK prices for exclusive life insurance leads typically run from about £30 to £80 per lead. Shared leads are usually advertised at £10 to £25, aged leads at £1 to £10 and hotkey transfers at £60 to £120.
Indicative ranges based on our view of typically advertised UK prices in 2026. Not a survey and not Protection Connect prices; on Protection Connect you set your own maximum.
There is no standard exclusive life insurance leads price. The FCA’s 2025 market study update describes the same picture: third-party lead generators charge per lead or per acquisition, and their prices vary with lead quality and exclusivity. Where a lead lands in that range depends less on the word “exclusive” than on what sits behind it.
What moves the price of an exclusive lead
| Driver | How it affects the price |
|---|---|
| How the price is set | A fixed rate card charges every buyer the same. On a marketplace the price depends on what other firms are prepared to pay for that enquiry when it arrives. |
| Your filters | Narrow age bands, non-smokers only or high cover amounts mean fewer matching enquiries and more competition for each one. |
| Product and case size | Larger cover amounts usually mean bigger premiums and more commission, so buyers are prepared to pay more for them. |
| Freshness | An enquiry delivered as soon as it’s matched is usually worth more than one delivered hours later or in a daily batch. |
| Source | Enquiries from people who went looking for cover and asked to be contacted usually cost more to generate than bought data lists. |
| What’s included | Credits for invalid numbers and duplicates, checks on contact details and delivery options are all part of what you pay for. |
| Commitments | Some sellers discount for a minimum monthly spend or a fixed term, which moves risk from the seller to you. |
Why exclusive costs more than shared
A seller has to recover what it costs to produce an enquiry: advertising, the website, compliance and staff. Sell the enquiry once and the whole cost sits with one buyer. Sell it four times and each buyer pays a fraction.
Illustrative example: a seller that spends £30 producing an enquiry has to charge one firm more than £30 to make money on it, or it can charge four firms £12 each and keep £18. The shared lead looks cheaper, but every buyer is now racing three others for the same customer. It also shows why the word gets stretched: an enquiry sold once at an exclusive price and again later as aged data earns twice.
Price per lead is only half the sum. Our guide to what life insurance leads cost in the UK covers pricing models and the hidden costs of buying, from dialling time to clawback. The next section turns the question round: what can you afford?
What should you pay for an exclusive lead?
Start from what a policy is worth to you, not from a seller’s price list. UK protection commission is mostly paid up front and can be taken back, and these figures from the FCA’s market study shape any sensible bid.
The lapse figure is for non-advised sales, so it isn’t a benchmark for advised business; across all policies in force, the FCA put the average lapse rate at 5%. It still matters for lead buyers. Some firms told the FCA that some early lapses may be due to poor-quality leads from lead generators, and every lapse inside the clawback period takes commission back out of the sum you used to justify the lead.
The calculator works backwards in two steps. Your average commission per policy, times the share of leads that become policies, gives the most a lead can cost before you lose money on it. Then you choose how much of that to spend on the lead itself, leaving the rest for advice time, admin, clawback risk and profit.
Calculator
What can you afford to pay for an exclusive lead?
Work back from your average commission and conversion rate to the most one exclusive enquiry is worth to your firm.
Initial commission is typically 170% to 250% of the first year’s premium (FCA, 2026). Use the commission your firm keeps after any network or principal share.
- Your maximum bid per lead
- –
- Break-even price per lead
- –
- Lead cost per policy at your maximum
- –
Illustrative calculator. The maximum bid is the most you would pay for one enquiry; on Protection Connect the price you actually pay can be lower (1p more than the next-highest eligible bid from another firm, or the minimum price), never higher.
Illustrative example: the defaults assume £750 of commission per policy, roughly what a policy at £25 to £37 a month earns at 170% to 250% initial commission. If 12% of your leads become policies, each lead is worth £90 to you before any costs (£750 × 12%). Spend half of that on leads and your maximum is £45, which works out at £375 of lead cost for every policy placed. These figures are examples chosen to show the method, not market averages or Protection Connect results.
Adjust for clawback and for your own costs
Two refinements make the figure more honest. First, allow for clawback. If you expect one policy in ten to lapse inside its clawback period with the full commission taken back, use 90% of your commission: £675 instead of £750, which brings the same maximum down to £40.50.
Second, question the share. Half of your commission is a generous lead budget. The FCA found that protection specialists in its sample spent about 30% of gross commission on lead generation and staff combined.
That figure includes staff, so the lead share alone was lower. Even at 30% for leads, the same case supports a maximum of £27. If that is below what exclusive enquiries cost for the customers you want, the answer is a better conversion rate, different criteria (such as a higher cover band) or a different lead type, not a hopeful bid. Check the result against our minimum price per enquiry, currently £35: a Protection Connect campaign can’t bid below it, and the calculator warns you when your figure falls short.
Lead costs are part of your distribution costs, so ask your compliance adviser how your fair value assessment takes account of them.
Work out a separate figure for each product. Over-50s plans have much smaller sums assured and different commission terms from term cover, so a bid that suits a term campaign tells you little about an over-50s one.
Are exclusive leads worth the extra cost?
They are when your conversion rate on them is high enough to bring the cost per policy below what cheaper leads would cost you. The calculator below puts four common lead types side by side, with the exclusive lead set to the same £45 and 12% as the example above.
Calculator
Exclusive leads against other lead types
Change each price and the share of leads that become policies to match your own results. The cheapest lead to buy is not always the cheapest policy.
- Lowest lead cost per policy
- –
Illustrative calculator: the default prices sit inside our indicative market ranges and the conversion rates are examples, not Protection Connect results or a forecast. Use your own numbers.
Illustrative example: with the defaults, an aged lead at £5 converting at 1% costs £500 per policy, a shared lead at £15 converting at 2.5% costs £600, an exclusive lead at £45 converting at 12% costs £375, and a hotkey transfer at £90 converting at 18% costs £500. The exclusive lead costs £30 more than the shared one to buy and £225 less per policy. These conversion rates are examples chosen to show the method. They are not market averages and not Protection Connect results.
Now drop the exclusive conversion rate to 8%. The cost per policy rises to about £563: still about £37 less than the shared lead, but more than the aged lead and the hotkey transfer at £500 each, so it is no longer the cheapest. That is the whole argument in one number: exclusive leads pay only if you convert them well, and you only learn your own rate from a test big enough to read.
How many exclusive leads do you need to judge a seller?
Small tests mislead, because each policy you place moves the average a long way. Illustrative example: buy 25 leads at £45 (£1,125) and, at a true conversion rate of 12%, you would expect three policies, or £375 of lead cost per policy. Place two instead and it reads £563; place four and it reads £281. Same seller, same leads, and a result that looks like a failure or a bargain by chance.
At 50 leads (£2,250 at the same price), one policy either way moves the figure to about £321 or £450: still wide, but readable. So set the test size and budget before you start, and judge the seller on cost per policy across the whole test rather than the first week. Watch contact rate and invalid leads alongside it, because those show up sooner.
On Protection Connect you can set a daily lead limit on a campaign to pace a test, and it resets at midnight UK time. These figures are examples chosen to show the method, not market averages or Protection Connect results.
Who exclusive leads suit, and who should think twice
Usually a good fit
Firms built around advice
- Advisers who handle their own calls and can’t win a dialling race
- Firms that take time to understand each customer’s needs before recommending cover
- Teams that can call during the working day as leads arrive
- Firms that want to be the only firm contacting a customer about their enquiry
Think twice
When the numbers don’t support it
- Your conversion rate on web enquiries is low, or you don’t know it yet
- Your typical case is small, such as low-premium single-life cover
- You can’t answer new leads until the next day
- You already run a dialling floor set up to work shared leads at volume
Where you sit also depends on how your firm works: a telephone brokerage with a dialler may make shared leads pay, while a mortgage adviser’s own clients should come before any bought lead. Our guide to choosing the right lead type for your firm works through each model in turn. If you’re weighing up hotkey transfers or aged leads instead, each has its own guide with the trade-offs and rules behind it.
Can you buy exclusive term, mortgage protection or whole of life leads?
Sellers often label exclusive life leads by product. The labels overlap, and they don’t always mean what a UK adviser expects, so it pays to know what each one usually contains.
| Label | What the customer usually wants | What to check | On Protection Connect |
|---|---|---|---|
| Exclusive term life insurance leads | Level or decreasing cover for a set term, often after a house move, a new mortgage or a new child | Age, smoker status, cover amount and term, single or joint | Life insurance enquiries from LifeAdviser. The term is passed on when the customer gives one but can’t be targeted, and you confirm the type of cover on your call |
| Exclusive mortgage protection leads | Cover to repay a mortgage on death, sometimes with critical illness or income protection | Whether the form asked about a mortgage at all, and what the label means | No separate product; the reason for cover isn’t passed on |
| Exclusive whole life insurance leads | Lifelong cover: underwritten whole of life, or a guaranteed acceptance over-50s plan | Which of the two it is, the customer’s age and the cover amount | No underwritten whole of life enquiries. We supply over-50s life insurance enquiries from 50Life; which plan suits the customer is a matter for your advice |
Exclusive term life insurance leads
Term cover is the core of the market. ABI figures quoted by the FCA show about 2 million new individual protection policies in 2024, including about 1.4 million term policies (0.4 million of them with accelerated critical illness), and the triggers are familiar: a house purchase, a new mortgage, a new child.
Case size varies more than many buyers allow for. Which? found a non-smoking 31-year-old could get £200,000 of level term over 25 years from about £8.20 a month (the average of the five cheapest quotes, April 2026). Illustrative example: at 170% to 250% initial commission, a policy at that premium earns roughly £167 to £246 up front. Against a £45 lead converting at 12%, which means £375 of lead cost per policy, that case doesn’t cover its lead cost on its own.
That is why age and cover filters matter so much on term campaigns. If small cases don’t cover their lead cost, change your filters or your maximum bid. The advice a customer gets should never change to make a lead pay. Our guide to term life insurance leads covers level, decreasing and family income benefit enquiries in detail.
Exclusive mortgage protection leads
In the UK, “mortgage protection” usually means term cover arranged to repay a mortgage, often decreasing in line with a repayment loan, sometimes alongside critical illness or income protection. US “mortgage protection leads” are often built from mortgage records and mailed reply cards, which is a different product and a different data question.
The need is real: the FCA cites research showing more than 40% of mortgage holders lack life insurance. For a mortgage adviser the first source is your own clients, at application and at remortgage. Before paying extra for a mortgage protection label on a bought lead, ask the seller which question on its form produced the label and what the customer actually said.
Protection Connect doesn’t sell a separate mortgage protection product. We supply life insurance enquiries from LifeAdviser. The reason for cover isn’t passed to you and can’t be targeted, so whether the customer has a mortgage to protect is something you find out on the call.
Exclusive whole life insurance leads
Whole of life is really two markets. Underwritten whole of life is a small, specialist product, often linked to estate planning: ABI figures quoted by the FCA show about 36,000 sold in 2024, out of about 0.2 million whole of life policies in total, most of them guaranteed acceptance over-50s plans.
Guaranteed acceptance over-50s plans ask no medical questions, and they typically have a waiting period, often 12 or 24 months, before the full benefit is paid on a death that isn’t accidental. Depending on how long the customer lives, the premiums paid can exceed the payout, so helping the customer understand what they are buying is central to the sale.
Most guaranteed plans are sold without advice: ABI figures in the FCA’s 2025 market study update put the advised share at 3% in 2023. The FCA’s final report found that, for healthy customers, a guaranteed plan cost on average 12% to 22% more than comparable underwritten whole of life, although below about £4,000 of cover the guaranteed plan was cheaper. Checking which would serve the customer better is part of the value of advice. Our guide to over-50s life insurance leads covers these enquiries in depth.
The FCA’s guidance on the fair treatment of vulnerable customers is worth rereading before you buy these enquiries. Protection Connect doesn’t supply underwritten whole of life enquiries. We supply over-50s life insurance enquiries from 50Life, and which plan suits each customer is a matter for your advice.
Exclusive life and over-50s enquiries, up to the maximum you set.
Every enquiry goes to one broker only. No fixed-term contract and no minimum monthly spend.
Exclusive life insurance leads for agents and appointed representatives
Search for exclusive life insurance leads for agents and most of what comes back is American: dollars, state licences, carriers and “final expense” cover. In the UK the FCA authorises firms, which can include sole traders, rather than licensing individual agents. You’ll be an adviser at a directly authorised firm, an adviser at an appointed representative (AR) of a principal firm, or an AR yourself.
Advisers carry most of this market. The FCA found that about 80% of protection policies were sold through intermediaries in 2024, and about 70% were advised. Of the policies sold through intermediaries, protection specialists placed 52%, mortgage advisers 36% and financial advisers 12%. That is the customer journey an exclusive lead feeds.
Who can buy depends on the seller, but a careful seller checks. The FCA Register shows a firm’s status, its permissions and, for an AR, its principal.
On Protection Connect only FCA authorised firms and their appointed representatives can buy. The firm, or for an AR its principal, must have permission to advise on and arrange non-investment insurance for retail customers, and we work only with firms that give advice. Introducer ARs can’t buy: they can pass on introductions but can’t advise on or arrange protection.
If you’re an appointed representative
Your principal is responsible for what you do, so its rules on lead sourcing come before any seller’s. Some networks approve particular lead suppliers or ask you to get sign-off before you buy. When an AR signs up with us, it confirms that its principal has approved it buying leads from Protection Connect.
Before your first purchase, ask your principal three things: whether bought leads are allowed, which sellers it has approved, and what records it wants you to keep about each lead.
If you’re self-employed or new to buying
Exclusive leads are a cash cost long before they become commission. Set a test budget you can afford to lose, cap each day’s spend, and judge the result on cost per policy over a test you sized in advance (see how many leads you need).
Indemnity commission makes cash flow look better than it is. If policies lapse inside the clawback period the commission comes back, so keep a reserve rather than spending every advance on more leads. Our guide to life insurance leads for agents and advisers in the UK covers ARs, network schemes and jobs advertised with leads provided.
How do you make the most of an exclusive lead?
Speed, a clear introduction and good records are what turn an exclusive lead into a policy.
Call while they’re still looking
An exclusive lead protects you from other firms calling about the same enquiry. It doesn’t protect you from the customer losing interest, and contact rates tend to drop quickly after an enquiry. Set up alerts, routing and cover for busy periods before you buy, not after the first lead lands. Our guide to real-time life insurance leads covers how to respond while the customer is still thinking about cover.
Introduce yourself properly
The customer asked to be contacted, but they may not know your firm’s name. Say who you are, that you’re an adviser firm, and how you got their details. When you obtain personal data from someone other than the person, UK GDPR Article 14 requires you to give them privacy information within a reasonable period and at the latest within one month, or when you first contact them if that comes sooner.
Check the rules on calls, emails and texts
Under PECR, calling a TPS-registered number for marketing needs the person to have told your firm that they don’t object to your calls. Marketing by email or text to details you got from someone else needs consent that names your firm and the channel, and the soft opt-in never applies to bought-in leads. How those rules apply to a particular seller’s wording is a judgement for your firm, so check it with your compliance adviser or network before you contact anyone, and keep the consent details that come with each lead.
- Open the lead and callUse the alert to open the lead in your inbox or CRM, and call as soon as you can.
- Introduce your firmYour name, your firm, why you’re calling and where their enquiry came from.
- Ask the exclusivity questionHas anyone else called about this enquiry? Record the answer against the source.
- Confirm the needWho the cover is for, how much, for how long, and what prompted the enquiry.
- Give your privacy informationAt the first contact at the latest, including where you got their details. Agree any written follow-up in a way your compliance adviser is happy with.
- Respect their choicesUse only the contact methods they agreed to, stop if they say they’re not interested, and record any objection to marketing so your firm doesn’t contact them again.
- Log the outcomeContacted, advised, applied or invalid, by lead source. Claim any credit inside the seller’s window.
For call structure and follow-up beyond the first day, see how to convert life insurance leads.
How exclusive leads work on Protection Connect
Protection Connect is a UK marketplace for exclusive life insurance leads. Enquiries come from our own consumer websites, LifeAdviser (life insurance) and 50Life (over-50s life insurance), from people looking for cover who asked to be contacted.
Every enquiry is delivered to one broker only. We never share, resell or recycle it, so no other broker receives it from us. Protection Connect is a trading style of PJG Financial Limited, which is authorised and regulated by the Financial Conduct Authority (FRN 919697), so you can look up PJG Financial Limited on the FCA Register, as we suggest for any seller.
How an enquiry reaches one broker on Protection Connect
From the moment someone looks for cover to the lead in your inbox.
- Looks for coverA real person looks for life insurance or over-50s cover online.
- Enquires and consentsOn LifeAdviser or 50Life they give their details and ask to be contacted.
- Eligibility firstOnly approved, FCA-checked firms whose campaign, budget and limits match.
- Highest bid winsThe winner pays 1p more than the next firm’s bid, or the minimum price. Never more than its maximum.
- Delivered to youIn your lead inbox with an email alert, or by webhook. Never shared or resold.
Who gets each enquiry, and what it costs
Eligibility comes first. A campaign can win only if it is active and matches the enquiry, its maximum bid is at least the minimum price, it is within its daily limits, the account has enough balance, and the firm is approved with its FCA checks current. Among eligible campaigns, the highest maximum bid wins, and we supply the enquiry to that firm only.
The winner pays 1p more than the next-highest maximum bid from another firm’s eligible campaign, up to its own maximum. If no other firm’s campaign is eligible, it pays the minimum price per enquiry, currently £35 for life and over-50s cover. On equal bids, the bid set first wins and pays that amount. Your own campaigns never push up your price, and other firms’ bids are never shown.
Illustrative example: your maximum is £45.00 and the next-highest eligible bid from another firm is £41.50. You receive the enquiry and pay £41.51. These figures are for demonstration only, not live marketplace data.
What you can target
You choose customers by product, age, smoker status and cover amount, and you set the most you’ll pay for each matching enquiry. You can set an age range anywhere from 18 to 100. Life cover bands start at £50,000 or more and go up to £500,000 or more; over-50s bands run from £5,000 or more to £20,000 or more.
Location covers the whole UK, and you can’t choose regions or postcode areas yourself at present. Term length, reason for cover, joint or single cover, income, occupation and health can’t be targeted.
What each lead contains
- Title, first and last name, a UK phone number, and an email address if the customer gave one
- Full postcode, age and smoking status
- The product, plus the cover amount and term when the customer gave them
- When they consented and the contact methods they agreed to
- The website it came from, a source label and a flag if it is a repeat enquiry
- Its reference and the price you paid
- Date of birth, IP address or device details
- A full address
- Answers outside your criteria, such as the reason for cover, or 50Life’s general health answer
You can see a fictional example in our sample enquiry. On LifeAdviser, the customer ticks: “I’d like Life Adviser, a trading style of PJG Financial Limited, to contact me about life insurance by phone or email. I have read the Privacy Policy and Terms.” They are then told an FCA authorised adviser firm will contact them, and that the firm pays us a fee for the introduction, at no extra cost to them.
They don’t see your firm’s name before they send the enquiry, so you say who you are when you call. When you set up your account, you confirm that you check numbers against the TPS where required before calling. Check with your compliance adviser how PECR applies to the way you contact these enquiries: TPS screening for live calls, and consent that names the sender for email and text.
Delivery, credits and money
Each enquiry is matched as soon as the customer sends it. It lands in your lead inbox and your team gets an email alert, which carries a link but never customer details. You can also send leads by webhook to Zapier or Make, and through them to your CRM; direct CRM connections are coming soon.
You can claim a credit within 48 hours of delivery if the phone number or email is invalid, the enquiry duplicates one we’ve already supplied to you or another firm, the customer is materially outside your campaign’s criteria, or it is fraudulent or a test. An approved claim credits the full price back to your balance. A customer who doesn’t answer, changes their mind or doesn’t buy isn’t grounds for a credit.
Exclusivity applies to each enquiry, not to each customer. If the same customer enquires again soon afterwards (currently within 30 days), a repeat that reaches your firm is delivered free and flagged; a repeat that reaches a different firm is charged to that firm and can be credited as a duplicate.
You pay in advance from a balance you top up by card, from £250, with no card fees and no VAT. There’s no subscription, no monthly fee, no fixed term and no minimum monthly spend.
Each campaign can have a daily limit by spend or by leads, which resets at midnight UK time. With no daily limit, a campaign keeps competing for matching enquiries until your balance runs out. You can pause one campaign or all buying at any time.
If you close your account, any unused balance is paid back within 14 days, less anything you owe. See what it costs to start and how it works for the full picture.
We check every applicant’s FRN against the FCA Register while they apply and again when they submit, covering status, permissions, any AR relationship and the regulatory record. We check the FCA Register again before buying opens, and a firm whose FCA check is no longer current can’t receive enquiries. Your firm’s eligibility is also checked when a customer submits an enquiry, before delivery and when you first open the lead.
Where we’re not the answer. We’re not a cheap per-lead source: the minimum price per enquiry is £35. We supply life insurance and over-50s life insurance enquiries only, not critical illness, income protection or a separate mortgage protection product. Before you top up, your dashboard shows whether enquiries are being supplied. Lead estimates are a guide, not a promise of volume. If price per lead is your main constraint, our guide to cheap life insurance leads explains when low-cost leads can still pay.
Questions brokers ask about exclusive leads
It should mean the seller supplies the enquiry to one firm only, with no time limit, and never shares, resells or recycles it into aged data or calling lists. It also shouldn’t be exclusive only within an area or for one product, and the seller shouldn’t advise or sell to the customer itself. Ask any seller to put its definition of exclusive, including any time limit, in its terms before you buy.
Advertised UK prices for exclusive life insurance leads typically run from about £30 to £80 per lead, depending on product, filters, freshness and how the price is set. Indicative ranges based on our view of typically advertised UK prices in 2026. Not a survey and not Protection Connect prices; on Protection Connect you set your own maximum. Our minimum price per enquiry is £35.
From lead marketplaces, lead generation agencies, affiliate sites and some network lead schemes, each with its own definition of exclusive and its own way of pricing. Before you buy, check the seller on the FCA Register, read its exclusivity and credit terms, and ask to see the consent wording customers saw. On Protection Connect, we supply exclusive life and over-50s enquiries from our own websites, LifeAdviser and 50Life, to FCA authorised firms and their appointed representatives only.
Not automatically. An exclusive lead costs more to buy, but you’re the only firm calling about that enquiry, which usually means better contact and conversion rates. Whether that makes it cheaper per policy depends on your own conversion rate and case size, so compare cost per policy rather than price per lead. Our guide to exclusive and shared leads covers the full comparison.
Buying leads isn’t a regulated activity in itself, but advising on and arranging protection is, so to advise the customer or arrange their cover you need to be an FCA authorised firm or an appointed representative of one. A careful seller checks this before it sells to you. On Protection Connect, only FCA authorised firms that give advice, and their appointed representatives, can buy, and every application is verified against the FCA register before approval.
Yes, if the seller accepts them and your principal allows it, so check your principal’s rules on lead sourcing first. On Protection Connect, a full appointed representative can apply if its principal is authorised with permission to advise on and arrange non-investment insurance for retail customers, and the AR confirms its principal has approved it buying leads from us. Every application is verified against the FCA register before approval. Introducer ARs can’t buy.
Possibly. Exclusivity is a promise about what the seller does with the enquiry, not about the customer, who may also have enquired elsewhere, asked their bank or spoken to a mortgage adviser. What a genuine exclusive lead rules out is other firms calling because of that same enquiry. Asking on the first call whether anyone else has been in touch is a quick way to test a seller.
They come from people who went looking for cover and asked to be contacted, reach you as soon as they’re matched, carry clear consent details, fit your criteria and are sold once with no time limit. Just as important, they convert well enough at your firm for the cost per policy to fit your commission. The best lead for a telephone brokerage may not suit a solo adviser.
It depends on the seller, so read the credit policy before you buy. On Protection Connect you can claim within 48 hours of delivery if the phone number or email is invalid, the enquiry is a duplicate, the customer is materially outside your criteria, or it’s fraudulent or a test. Approved claims are credited to your balance in full. A customer not answering or not buying isn’t grounds for a credit.
Not as a separate product. We supply life insurance enquiries from LifeAdviser and over-50s life insurance enquiries from 50Life only. The reason for cover isn’t passed on and can’t be targeted, so whether a customer has a mortgage to protect is something you find out when you call. We don’t supply critical illness or income protection enquiries either.
Sources and further reading
- FCA: Pure protection market study update (MS24/1.3), September 2025
- FCA: Distribution of pure protection products to retail customers, market study interim report (MS24/1.4), January 2026
- FCA: Pure protection market study final report (MS24/1.5), September 2026
- FCA: Financial Services Register
- FCA: Consumer Duty
- FCA: Guidance for firms on the fair treatment of vulnerable customers (FG21/1)
- ICO: Direct marketing and privacy and electronic communications
- ICO: When should we provide privacy information?
- ICO: Fines of £225,000 for nuisance marketing messages (January 2026)
- Which?: More people are looking for affordable life insurance, but what does it actually cost? (April 2026)
