AI and Insurance – thoughts by Yafa Sakkejha, CEO of Beneplan Inc. Yafa will be speaking at the upcoming Mobey Day 2018 in Toronto on 23-24 May.
1. In what ways is Beneplan using AI to enhance insurance products?
Beneplan is in the early stages of user journey mapping and exploration to identify which tools we could build which would provide the maximum value to the organization given the investment involved. The areas of our operations we are looking to potentially enhance are as follows:
- Pricing and underwriting of group insurance products
- Plan-member (customer) service interactions (chatbots)
- Adjudication of complex disability claims (short and long term disability)
2. What are the biggest trends in insuretech for the next 12 years?
- Using blockchain enabled platforms to create new ecosystems for risk retention and transfer
- A resurrection of mutual or peer-to-peer, social insurance platforms
- Using machine learning to better use the huge volumes of data available to better predict risk, premiums and profit
- The continuation of digital tools to support the much-needed human advisors in the field providing high quality advice to clients
3. How are consumers responding to these new insurance products?
- PURCHASING: Beneplan is in the B2B insurance space, selling to other businesses. Businesses today are still largely using legacy practices to purchase or transfer group benefits coverage, but we are seeing the ‘canary in the coal-mine’ whereby younger influencers now part of the sales cycle are weaving in modern methods of research and purchasing. For example, our target customer might be a company with 300 employees, where the sale involves influencing the Choosers (Owner / CEO / CFO) and the Users (HR / Office Admin / Ops / Employees). The Choosers may be of an older generation, but the Users clearly now have millennials on their team, and Gen Z is not too far behind as they join the workforce in the next few years. While Choosers may have patience for long-winded presentations or personal connections, Millennials and Gen Z Users are more inclined to do research and purchasing online (Goldman Sachs).
- POLICY DELIVERY: All generations are increasingly demanding paperless and e-signature options for policies.
- CLAIMS PAYMENT: There is a greater demand for more rapid claims payment, and almost entirely electronically. The first set of employees being paid in crypto-currency is starting to emerge Canada (companies like Montreal based ShakePay), and it is yet to be seen if currency will truly be a trend or a flash in the pan.
- DISPUTE RESOLUTION: As attention spans plummet, demand for more rapid turnaround times continues to put pressure on insurers. Insurers who provide chatbots or ‘robo’ service are still using manual techniques to respond, but are rapidly trying to automate this to the extent that they can.
