2023 Gratitude: Another Year of Customer Experience Excellence in Insurance

It’s hard to believe another year is about to wrap to a close, isn’t it? 🤯

Time flies when you’re having fun‌ — ‌or, at the very least, when a lot is happening, and you’ve got a lot to be grateful for.

And since we like to keep our fingers on the pulse of what’s changing for the better in insurance, we wanted to express our gratitude for all the work our clients, partners, and even our competitors put into making insurance so much better for everyone.

No More Crappy Customer Experiences

As we were compiling these stories, we‌ expected them to be all over the place with where innovation was happening or what people were grateful for regarding insurance. But there’s one thread that ties them all together: insurers making sure customer experience comes first.

They’re using their resources to step up their game to help customers, and we couldn’t be more thrilled. Whether it’s the customer getting paid quickly from a speedy claim settlement, or insurers just caring about someone’s emotional state during the time of crisis a claim represents, experiences are improving.

Ambitious Insurers Showing Initiative

Earlier in the year, we hosted The Ambitious Insurer Awards at ITI in North America and Europe, and were floored at the commitment we saw to better customer experience.

For example:

Allianz Re & OKO provide weather insurance for farmers in Cote d’Ivoire. By helping farmers keep tabs on things like soil moisture and evapotranspiration, they can improve and fine-tune their policies every year… and make sure ‌farmers are financially covered should the worst happen.
Generali helps both “high-risk” migrant tenants find housing and landlords to secure reliable, grateful tenants that might others be looked over.
Slide Insurance provides a new approach to underwriting for coastal homeowners. This is a huge relief to many of who’ve dealt with potentially being dumped by or priced out of their current insurer’s policies due to the high-risk weather conditions.
Policy Expert saves their customers lots of money in the middle of a cost of living crisis and ever-increasing homeowners insurance. Their new bronze line of coverage now represents 20% of their policies sold.
NEXT Insurance provides innovative pay-as-you-go worker’s comp insurance to small businesses, who often aren’t sure if they have enough coverage.

Recognizing that 80% of chronic disease comes from lifestyle factors, YuLife knew that only helping at the point of a claim wasn’t enough. Taking hints from the gaming industry and behavioral science, they made an app that engages people daily and encourages them to live healthier lives. As a result, step counts have increased by 11%, and a massive 87% of users say they feel more energized at work as a result.

Getting Personal with Our Gratitude

Stories about insurance company initiatives are certainly interesting, but what about the perspective of the individual?

Stacy Hines, CTO at BCIC, was in Jamaica on the morning of October 30th, when a 5.4 magnitude earthquake hit the island. She was visiting her old high school at the time, and said, “The experience was nothing short of terrifying, as the building I was in trembled and swayed, causing me to lose my balance. The children around me were in a state of panic, screaming, crying, and some even experiencing panic attacks. It took me quite some time to make my way back home. In the aftermath of the quake, there was a power outage, and the phone lines were overwhelmed, making it impossible to reach my children and my partner for several agonizing hours. The day was marked by a pervasive sense of anxiety, fear, and sadness.”

It was a day full of emotional and psychological trauma for a lot of people, but a chance for Stacy to also see first-hand how much her company cared about her and the others experiencing the disaster.

“In the afternoon, amidst the chaos, I received an email from Peter Levy, the CEO of BCIC,” she said. “His heartfelt concern and well wishes were deeply comforting… receiving his message in the midst of the turmoil provided an instant sense of calm, knowing that someone cared and was there to offer support.

“It was noteworthy that BCIC, despite dealing with its own challenges, had staff in the office who were experiencing the earthquake themselves. Yet, the company understood the immediate needs of its customers and took steps to ensure their well-being while also managing their own safety. This experience reaffirmed my pride in being part of an organization that prioritized the welfare of its customers during times of crisis.”

One of our own employees shared a story of gratitude during a stressful situation in her life, which also shows the contrast in insurers willing to put claimants and their needs front and center:

“While one P&C claim with homeowner’s insurance has been dragging on for six months now with still no resolution, I am thankful for other P&C insurers who are putting fast claims processing technology in place,” she said.

“In early January, I had to take my dog into an emergency vet twice, and get her a follow-up with her regular vet after an ill-meaning individual fed her something poisonous. To say the least, the bills were not cheap, and I was worried about her health. Fortunately, the pet insurance company I chose had an app where I could easily open a claim and submit bills and statements from the various vets about my dog’s condition.

“Within a matter of days, the claim was processed and settled, with the payment being sent directly into my checking account. It turned a stressful situation into something that was much easier to manage, because I was reimbursed quickly according to my coverage, and the process for getting the information in front of the right people was really easy, thanks to the insurer’s tech setup.”

Other Noteworthy Advancements… And Funny Insurance Commercials

In addition to the specific advancements and experiences listed above, the overall trend of insurers becoming more ambitious and more technologically adept is something we’re really grateful for, for very fundamental reasons. Just to name a few:

Better and more user-friendly mobile applications make insurance products more accessible to the masses, making sure more people are financially covered in case of emergency.
Personalization through AI and machine learning means customers can get tailored policies and tailored bundles bespoke to their unique financial needs. The technology backbone of it also means it can be done at scale without the need for lots of per-customer manual labor.
Big data analytics help insurers better assess risk, and better understand the nuances of risk between different situations. This saves customers money and provides more coverage options to those who need it.
More insurers moving towards cloud-based computing means they’re able to store more data more securely, and in a way that’s efficient and scalable. Practically, this means that storing and using the data needed to provide more accurate underwriting and personalized products doesn’t have to equate to higher costs that get passed onto the consumer.

And, of course, there’s all the fun insurance commercials we love to watch… and some wonderful ones have come out this year. 📺 From the Progressive/Barbie mash-up to CSAA’s resurgence of boy bands and the Rick Roll, they’ve been amazing.

Rob Walker, a PwC Partner, sums it all up nicely:

“I’m thankful for insurance carriers adopting a customer-first perspective that will support a seamless experience across the offering ecosystem…and watching all of the awesome insurance commercials during the football games over the long weekend! ”

Want Inspiration for 2024?

We’ve seen some serious momentum in 2023, and can’t wait to see what kind of incredible things ambitious insurers accomplish in 2024.

If you’re looking for some inspiration to add some oomph to your 2024 plans to make things better for your customers, here are some top-notch resources to help you do so: