Table of Contents

01  The Insurance Monthly Roundup

02  Why Businesses Should Migrate To Digital Claims Management Process?

03  Incipient Insurance: Attitudinal Variations amongst Gen Z in India

04  Broadening Capabilities of Insurance in Metaverse

05  Bridging The Trust Deficit Amongst The Insurance Customers

The Insurance Monthly Roundup

A quick roundup of the month’s insurance and insurtech news.

(India)

• The government of India launched DigiClaim platform for quick disbursal of crop insurance claims.

Farmers can now get claim amounts online and track the claim settlement process on their mobile phones in real-time.

• Kotak General Insurance ties up with actyv.ai to sell insurance products to MSMEs.

Through this partnership, Kotak General Insurance will leverage actyv.ai’s AI-powered platform to create bite-sized insurance solutions for micro, small, and medium enterprise (MSME) businesses.

• 3 new companies joined the insurance bandwagon and 20 more are in the pipeline.

Kshema General Insurance becomes the first general insurer to receive a  license from IRDAI since 2017. This comes after Credit Access Life and Acko Life were granted licenses.

“The regulator is evaluating nearly 20 more applications for granting licenses”, says, IRDAI Chairman Debasish Panda.

• InsuranceDekho acqui-hired Mumbai-based Verak.

This deal will help InsuranceDekho strengthen its presence in the SME (small medium enterprise) insurance business vertical and expand its product portfolio.

• Mohali-based, Vitraya received $5 million in funding to expand its presence. 

The firm will infuse this fresh amount to extend its global business operation and workforce and develop its current product and technological offerings.

(Global)

• Arch Insurance acquired Thimble, an insurtech platform allowing small businesses to buy insurance coverage by job, month, or year using an app, website, or phone.

The Vancouver-based startup will use the funding to accelerate the adoption of its insurance super app in Canada and the US.

• Axle, a universal API developer, received $4 million. 

With the additional funding, the firm plans to expand its workforce and penetrate new markets.

• Bolt teamed up with Choice Home Warranty, a US-based home warranty service contract provider, to enhance household coverage.

Through this partnership, distributors will be able to offer comprehensive home and smartphone protection easily and efficiently and a top-notch service to their customers.

Loyalty Strategies for Digital Insurers in the USA

Read the full blog, here.

Why Businesses Should Migrate To Digital Claims Management Process?

The Insurance industry is experiencing tectonic shifts across consumer expectations and process digitalization. While companies have been introducing digital touchpoints across the customer lifecycle, a major chunk of focus remains on the pre-purchase and purchase stages of the journey. Amidst rising customer acquisition costs, companies must provide efficient solutions to enhance the experience in the claims and renewal stages of insurance. 

Based on a survey conducted by SPS Global, 59% of policyholders were dissatisfied with their claims handling. Digital claims processing introduces digital touchpoints to improve the claims customer journey. And, making the process more time and cost-effective for insurers while boosting the overall customer experience.

How would a company benefit from the Digital Claims Process?

1. Faster Claims Processing – The traditional claims process has a long cycle and friction due to multiple physical and digital touchpoints. The verification process involves multiple teams which would be tough to coordinate in a manual setup. Digital channels make it easier to collaborate and settle claims faster.
2. Reduced Duplication of Effort – Digital means help streamline the operations by leveraging a single unified portal for the teams involved in the process. Providing clear action items, timelines, and statuses for each stakeholder, the platform helps reduce business costs. 
3. Improved Fraud Detection – AI-powered fraud detection systems help reduce the chances of fraud significantly. Companies such as TagX and DataTrade provide extensive data sets to help insurance companies develop and train their own algorithms and models. 
4. Higher Customer Satisfaction – Amidst an unfortunate scenario, the insured would prefer minimal delays, simplified processes, and quick settlement. Digital claims processing not only helps speed up the process but also personalizes it for the user. Eventually, the service and support provided boost customer satisfaction and renewal rates. 

The digital transformation of a company’s claims function lies in the redesign of its customer claims journey – Where the changes are not piecemeal solutions or interactions, but a reimagining of how the end-to-end journey will be actionized, perceived, and experienced. As companies begin their journey toward digital claims processing, they need to understand and deliver the core value that users gain from digitalization. 

Read the blog, here.

Incipient Insurance: Attitudinal Variations amongst Gen Z in India

There is no getting around the fact that India, despite being one of the world’s leading economies has an abysmally low level of penetration when it comes to Insurance. As a new cohort makes its way to working age and begins to confront the many dilemmas of adulthood, Insurance seems to have taken center stage. A looming pandemic, coupled with the younger generation being witness to the ill effects of rapid urbanization and sedentary lifestyles has highlighted the importance of insurance to India’s GenZ population. Technology has finally caught up to the insurance industry and is working its way toward disrupting it at a record pace. Improved connectivity and radically improved customer service in adjacent industries have raised the bar for satisfying GenZ. This is the primary factor that is driving the expectations and attitudes of GenZ when it comes to Insurance.

Read the blog here.

Broadening Capabilities of Insurance in Metaverse

With over $25Bn dollars having been invested into it by Facebook alone, Metaverse is here to stay for the long run. And for Insurers, the possibilities offered by metaverse are hard to ignore. This means they finally have a tool to combine the efficiencies of AI-powered chatbots, with the warmth of face-to-face interactions. Internal training, conducting sales pitches, and using NFTs to verify personal documents are some of the most highly anticipated use cases. Max Life Insurance, a leading Indian insurance player has already started to think about how best to use the metaverse to boost employee engagement and morale.

Read More.

Bridging The Trust Deficit Amongst The Insurance Customers

U.S.A Today

The economy of the U.S.A. is currently in the grips of an economic crisis the likes of which we haven’t seen before. Unlike its predecessors, this one sits amidst multiple realities: those experiencing unprecedented growth and those dealing with a significant downturn.

One common theme that should be of concern to consumer-facing businesses would be the rising inflation in personal consumption expenditure (PCE). The insurance industry is bound to bear the brunt of this as wallets are tightening and discretionary expenditures (even insurance) are on a downward trend. With so many areas of friction for the end consumer, how can insurance companies seek to correct the double whammy of rising costs and dipping revenues? Technology and better customer experience could be the way.

Experimentation pays

Lemonade, the InsurTech startup that pioneered the model of online first insurance delivery and completely eliminated brokers, and chose to become a carrier itself. Doing this allowed it to offer competitive insurance rates, while also becoming a staple in the technology stack of millennials in the U.S.A. Lemonade operates entirely via mobile applications and takes full advantage of its data reserves and artificial intelligence to automate claim verification, fraud detection, and all other cumbersome vetting processes to make the insurance delivery process super smooth.

It’s no wonder that it’s become a billion-dollar company in less than 10 years of its launch.

Read the blog here.