Guides

How to export your book of business

Every agency management system calls it something different and none of them make it obvious. Here is where the export lives in each of them, which fields to include, and the handful of mistakes that make a file unusable once it arrives.

What a book export needs to contain

These four matter most. An export missing any of them limits what can be found, and an export carrying all four is already useful:

Policy statusActive, lapsed, pending, terminated. Without it we cannot tell an opportunity from a closed case.
Policy type or productTerm, whole life, universal life, annuity. Term length often lives in the product name.
Issue or effective dateNearly every deadline is measured from it.
Date of birthDrives Medicare eligibility, age-pricing deadlines and rate-age changes.

Everything below makes the results sharper. Include whatever your system holds:

Term lengthIf it is a separate field rather than buried in the product name.
Face amountHow we rank opportunities by the commission actually on the table.
Premium and modeNeeded for premium-jump estimates at the end of a level term.
Carrier and product nameConversion privileges and surrender schedules are carrier-specific.
Servicing producer or agent of recordSo results route to the right person, and so orphan policies are visible as orphans.
Paid-to date or next due dateIdentifies policies sitting in a grace period.
Underwriting classTobacco status makes re-write opportunities findable.

Leave these out. None of them are needed to find a deadline, and sending them creates risk for you rather than value for anyone:

  • Social Security or tax ID numbers
  • Bank account, card, or payment details
  • Medical records or underwriting correspondence
  • Policy documents and beneficiary designations

Check the file before you send it

Two minutes here saves a round trip. These come up regardless of which system produced the file, and the first two account for most of them:

One row per policy, not per clientThe clients worth calling are frequently the ones holding several policies. A contact-level export hides them.
Real dates, one formatDates stored as text, or as a mix of formats in one column, are the most common reason an export needs a round trip. Two-digit years are ambiguous: 3/1/32 could be 1932 or 2032, and for a date of birth both are plausible.
One header row, no merged cellsA report designed to be printed usually has a title, a date and a blank line above the real headers. Delete them so row one is the header row.
No subtotal or total rowsRows that summarise other rows get read as policies. Delete them, along with any notes typed under the data.
Include lapsed and terminated policiesFiltering to active only removes the grace-period and lapse cases, which are opportunities in their own right.
A legend for coded valuesIf status is "A", "L", "T" or premium mode is "1", "4", "12", send a note explaining the codes. It takes you a minute and saves a round trip.
Names are optionalFor a first scan you can replace the name column with row IDs. The deadline arithmetic runs on dates, ages, terms and amounts. Names only matter once you want the call list back.

Getting the export out of your system

A click path appears below only where it comes from the vendor's own public documentation, cited with it. Where a vendor's help sits behind a customer login or changes per release, the page says so and sends you to the vendor rather than guessing at a menu path — a plausible-sounding wrong path is worse than none.

AgencyBloc AMS+

Agency management system · AgencyBloc · sources checked September 4, 2026

AgencyBloc AMS+ is built specifically around life and health workflows, which is why a large share of the books we see come out of it. It carries policy records with carrier, product, status, effective dates and premium, so an AMS+ export is usually one of the more complete starting points.

AMS+ includes a custom report builder alongside its pre-built sales, servicing, agency and commission reports. The builder is the right tool here: you choose the data fields you want, apply filters, set the columns, and save the report so it can be re-run later without rebuilding it.

Build it once against the field list below and save it as something like "Pendwell book export". You will want to run it again, because a book scan is worth repeating as dates move.

On the exact click path. AgencyBloc's step-by-step help articles sit behind a customer login, so we are not going to publish a menu path we cannot verify from public documentation. Use the in-app help or your AgencyBloc support contact for the exact clicks; the field list and checks below are what actually matter, and they apply whatever the path turns out to be.

Traps specific to AgencyBloc AMS+

  • Run the report against policies rather than contacts. A contact-level export gives you one row per client and silently collapses clients who hold more than one policy, which is exactly the population worth calling.
  • Include terminated and lapsed policies rather than filtering to active only. Lapse and grace-period cases are opportunities, and a status column lets us separate them.
  • If your agency tracks term length in the product name rather than a dedicated field, include the product name column so the term can be read from it.

Vendor documentation: AgencyBloc — Reporting and data analysis for insurance sales · AgencyBloc — How to organize your book of business

Radius

Insurance CRM and lead management · AgencyBloc · sources checked September 4, 2026

Radius is an insurance-specific CRM and lead management platform, now part of AgencyBloc. It tracks policies against both clients and leads, with coverage type, policy status, carrier, product, effective date, renewal date and application date, which makes it a workable source for a book scan.

Radius handles this through Saved Reports. You build a report over policies, choose which columns appear, and download the result as a CSV or have it emailed to you.

One quirk worth knowing before you start: anything you use as a grouping must also appear in the report's columns, or it will not come through in the file.

  1. Go to Reports, then Saved Reports, and create a new report.
  2. Choose which policy types to include. Client Policies and Lead Policies are separate; include both unless you only want existing clients.
  3. Filter by policy status and by renewal or effective date range. For a first scan, keep the range wide rather than narrow.
  4. Set your grouping if you want one, for example by assigned agent or by carrier.
  5. In Edit Report Columns, add the fields from the list below. Remember that anything used as a grouping also has to be selected as a column.
  6. Run the report, then download the CSV or email it to yourself.

Traps specific to Radius

  • Client Policies and Lead Policies are separate selections. Picking only one is the most common way a Radius export comes back half the size it should be.
  • Keep the Record Product ID column if it is offered. It is the field Radius uses to match rows back to policies, so keeping it means results can be loaded back in later rather than matched by hand.
  • Do not filter to active statuses only. Include lapsed and pending, and let the status column carry that information.

Vendor documentation: Radius Help — Using Saved Reports to update policies · Radius Help — Reports & Analysis · Radius Help — Managing and creating carriers, products and policies

Vertafore AMS360

Agency management system · Vertafore · sources checked September 4, 2026

AMS360 is Vertafore's agency management system, common in agencies that carry both property and casualty and life. It ships with a Policy Book of Business report that is close to purpose-built for this, because it reports the in-force book by line of business with one policy term per entry.

Use the Policy Book of Business report. It covers billed and unbilled policies, and it filters by line of business, so you can pull Life on its own rather than sorting it out of a mixed book afterwards.

It also takes a Policy In-Force Date, which evaluates the book as of a point in time. Leave it at today unless you have a reason not to.

Take the CSV output rather than the printed report. Vertafore documents the CSV as carrying expanded detail the printed version does not, including full business unit splits and commission fields.

  1. Open the Policy Book of Business report.
  2. Set the Policy In-Force Date to evaluate the book as of today.
  3. Under Line of Business, select Life. Add Health or Financial Services as well if those sit in the same book and you want them scanned.
  4. Choose your personnel selections — executive, representative, broker — or leave them open to cover the whole agency.
  5. Decide how continuous policies are handled: include them, since a continuous policy can still carry an opportunity.
  6. Output the report as CSV rather than printing it, and save the file.

Traps specific to Vertafore AMS360

  • The printed report and the CSV are not the same thing. The CSV carries materially more detail, so a printed export sent to us will be missing fields we would otherwise use.
  • The report is organised as one policy term per entry, which is what you want. Do not collapse it to one row per customer.
  • If your agency runs multiple business units, leave the personnel filters open for a first scan. Narrowing to one representative hides the orphan book, which is usually the most valuable part of the export.

Vendor documentation: Vertafore AMS360 Help — Report: Policy Book of Business

Applied Epic

Agency management system · Applied Systems · sources checked September 4, 2026

Applied Epic is the broad agency management platform, strongest in property and casualty and benefits, and common in larger agencies that also carry a life book. Epic holds policy administration, client records and reporting in one system, so the data is there — the work is getting a policy-level extract out of it.

Epic's own reporting is where a policy-level extract comes from. Applied publishes its product help at help.appliedsystems.com, and that is the reference to work from rather than anything we could paraphrase here.

Two things are worth knowing before you start. Export is commonly gated behind a role permission in Applied products, so if you cannot see an export option the answer is usually your Epic administrator rather than the software. And Applied Marketing Automation, which sits alongside Epic, has its own list export that produces a contact-level CSV — useful for a mailing list, but not a substitute for a policy-level export, because it is organised around contacts rather than policy terms.

On the exact click path. Applied's detailed Epic documentation is organised per module and per release, and we are not going to reproduce a menu path that may not match your version. Work from Applied's help portal or your agency's Epic administrator. What follows is the part that does not change: the fields the export needs, and the checks worth running on the file before you send it.

Traps specific to Applied Epic

  • If the export option is missing, check your role before you check the software. In Applied products the export capability is typically attached to an Admin role or a custom role carrying an export permission.
  • A contact list export is not a book export. Applied Marketing Automation lists are built around contacts and are documented as exporting contact-level detail, so a life book pulled that way loses the policy terms that make it scannable.
  • Larger Epic agencies often run several structures or business units. Confirm the extract covers all of them, not just the one you are looking at.

Vendor documentation: Applied Systems Help — Reports and metrics · Applied Systems Help — Create a list (Applied Marketing Automation)

Salesforce Financial Services Cloud

CRM platform · Salesforce · sources checked September 4, 2026

Financial Services Cloud is Salesforce configured for financial services, and agencies on it usually hold policies as a custom or standard asset-style object. Because every org is configured differently, the object and field names on your instance are yours — but the export mechanics are the same Salesforce ones.

Build a report over whatever object your org holds policies on, add the fields from the list below as columns, then export it.

The important part is how you export. Salesforce offers a formatted export and a details-only export, and you want Details Only with the format set to Comma Delimited .csv. A formatted export carries the report's groupings, subtotals and header rows into the file, and those turn a clean table into something that has to be unpicked by hand before anything can read it.

  1. Create or open a report over the object your org uses for policies.
  2. Add the fields from the list below as report columns.
  3. Remove groupings and subtotals, or accept that you will be exporting Details Only, which drops them anyway.
  4. Click Export.
  5. Choose Details Only rather than Formatted Report.
  6. Set the format to Comma Delimited .csv and export.

Traps specific to Salesforce Financial Services Cloud

  • Exporting a Formatted Report is the single most common mistake here. It embeds groupings and subtotals in the file and produces something that reads as a report rather than a table.
  • Salesforce reports are subject to row limits. If your book is larger than the limit, split the report by carrier, producer, or effective-date range and send us the parts rather than a silently truncated file.
  • Because FSC configurations differ, tell us what your policy object is called when you send the file. It saves a round trip on field mapping.

Vendor documentation: Salesforce Trailhead — Learn data export methods and steps for Salesforce · Salesforce Trailhead — Manage reported data

Redtail CRM

CRM for financial professionals · Redtail Technology · sources checked September 4, 2026

Redtail is a CRM for financial advisors rather than a policy administration system, so how much policy detail you get out of it depends on how thoroughly your team records policies inside it. It is worth exporting anyway: even a thin export carries dates of birth and client records, which is enough to surface age-driven opportunities.

Redtail exports run off contact lists, with Custom Export Templates controlling which fields come through. Build a template with the fields from the list below, apply it to the list you want, and export.

There is no single button that exports everything at once. If your policy detail lives somewhere Redtail exports awkwardly, send what you can and tell us what is missing — we would rather scan a partial book than wait for a perfect one.

On the exact click path. Redtail's help centre is public but its export articles are organised by record type and change with releases, so check help.redtailtechnology.com for the current path rather than trusting a path printed here. The Custom Export Template mechanism is the thing to look for.

Traps specific to Redtail CRM

  • Check what your export template can actually reach before assuming policy fields are included. In a CRM, policy data is only as good as what was typed into it.
  • If policy detail is thin, still include date of birth. Age-driven opportunities — Medicare eligibility, age-pricing deadlines, rate-age changes — need nothing else.
  • Exports run off a list, so make sure the list is the whole book rather than a saved filter someone built for a campaign.

Vendor documentation: Redtail Technology — Help centre · Redtail Technology — Support articles

A spreadsheet you already keep

No agency management system · Excel or Google Sheets · sources checked September 4, 2026

Plenty of agencies run their life book out of Excel or Google Sheets, sometimes alongside carrier portals. That is not a problem. A spreadsheet you maintain yourself is often cleaner than an AMS export, because nobody has wrapped it in report formatting.

There is nothing to export: you already have the file. The work is making sure it is shaped like a table rather than like a document.

Save it as .csv or .xlsx and send that. If you keep it in Google Sheets, File then Download then Comma Separated Values.

  1. Put every policy on its own row. A client with three policies gets three rows.
  2. Give every column a single header in the first row, with no blank rows above it and no merged cells.
  3. Delete subtotal rows, total rows, and any notes typed underneath the data.
  4. Make sure dates are real dates in one consistent format, not free text like "Mar 06" or "next spring".
  5. Save as .csv or .xlsx.

Traps specific to A spreadsheet you already keep

  • Merged cells and multi-row headers are the most common problem in hand-kept spreadsheets, and they are the hardest to unpick automatically.
  • Colour is not data. If rows are highlighted to mean something, add a column that says what the colour means, because the meaning does not survive the file.
  • Multiple tabs are fine, but tell us which tab is the book. One tab per producer is fine too.

Running something not listed? The field list and the checks above apply whatever produced the file. Tell us what you use and we will work out the export with you, and add it here for the next agency on it.

Common questions

What is a book of business export?

A book of business export is a file, usually CSV or Excel, listing every policy an agency has on the books, one row per policy, with the fields that describe it: status, product, issue date, the insured's date of birth, face amount and premium. It is what any review of a book — a scan, an audit, a producer handover — starts from.

Which fields does a book export need?

Four are essential: policy status, policy type or product, issue or effective date, and date of birth. Term length, face amount, premium and mode, carrier and product, servicing producer, paid-to date and underwriting class all make the results sharper. Social Security numbers, payment details and medical records are never needed and should be stripped before the file leaves your system.

Should a book export be one row per client or one row per policy?

One row per policy. Clients holding several policies are often the most valuable ones to call, and a contact-level export collapses them into one row and hides the rest.

Can I remove client names from a book export?

Yes. Replace the name column with row IDs and the export still works, because the deadline arithmetic runs on dates, ages, policy types, terms and amounts rather than on names. Names only become necessary at the point you want a call list back.

Why this exists

Pendwell Life scans life insurance books for the deadlines worth real commission, and the export is the first step every time. Getting it right at the start is the difference between a scan that comes back in days and one that spends a week going back and forth over date formats.

It is also just useful. A clean policy-level export is what any producer handover, orphan-book review, or agency valuation starts from, whether or not you ever send it to us.

Send us your book. We'll show you what's sitting in it.

The scan is free and there's nothing to integrate. Tell us about your agency and we'll come back with who to call, why, and what it's worth.

Don't send any client data yet. We'll reply within 24 hours with exactly what to export and how to get it to us. How we handle your data.