The benefit is a much greater degree of comfort with the purchase of the product (not always questioning why they bought it) and a broader understanding of the insurance’s role in their life.
FTA: Why are some insurers so slow to offer this? Is it just a question of technology or is it also a regulatory fear?
OW: Insurers are slow because they have two major challenges to overcome simultaneously in order to deliver more personalisation.
They need to upgrade the customer-facing elements of the organisation while enhancing and modernising the back-end systems.
Each of these sits in different parts of the business and finding alignment between these two parts in terms of prioritisation, delivery timelines and budget is incredibly slow.
It takes very long to get consensus and to prioritise projects that should be delivered, and it also takes long to deliver.
FTA: What changes can you envision technology driving in the insurance space over the next five years or so?
OW: A significant amount of legacy system modernisation, driven by technology and new business models, will have a profound effect on the insurers’ ability to deliver operational efficiency as well as new product and customer journey capabilities.
This revitalisation will also allow new market partnerships to be more easily implemented. Partnerships will pave the way for insurance offering, extending value and extracting services for their customers beyond just insurance.
Insurers can then deliver a more personalised and holistic solution to customers that manages their risk as well as pays out when things go wrong.
FTA: Will we ever get to the stage where brokers can sell a holistic wellness package that incorporates insurance, support services, counselling, GP access, etc?
OW: It is inevitable because broadly the market is moving to a more embedded solution model.
Even brokers should be welcoming the opportunity because this also opens new revenue streams and opportunities to create greater customer loyalty by providing more value.
simoney.kyriakou@ft.com
