Imagine this: you take your family away on a dream vacation and make memories that will last a lifetime. But on returning home, you find your house flooded due to a burst water pipe. Those wonderful family memories are shattered in an instant and the trip will forever be tainted by the tragic return.
In this situation, will a robot make you feel better? Will a chatbot on your broker’s or insurer’s website give you the reassurance and encouragement you need to put on a brave face and get the claim process started? – Not necessarily.
“Insurance is about people; it’s not all about stuff,” said Robin Monniere, vice president of brand development and customer experience at Intact Insurance. “Although the insurance contract covers cars or homes, what the industry is really protecting is the lifestyle or wellbeing of the individual who bought the policy. At the end of the day, the people part is more important than the stuff.”
Intact Insurance recently launched a new brand campaign for 2018 called Empathy is Everything. The campaign is based on the insurer’s core principal that insurance is about people, not things – and the important role empathy plays in bringing this to life for its customers.
This drive for human empathy comes at a time when more and more insurers are reducing human touch points in their distribution processes, and offering more direct-to-consumer digital, online tools.
“Empathy is a value that only humans can give or feel. At Intact, we believe that if you bring technology into insurance but then lose all sense of caring for your customer, then you’re missing a big part of the equation,” Monniere told Insurance Business. “You have to offer a balance of technology, convenience and top service – and there always has to be a human root behind it.
“If a house gets flooded or burns down, it’s a human drama. Technology won’t save you from this, but if you feel like there are people there with you, that support will go a long way – more than just a technology solution by itself.”
As Canada’s largest home, auto and business insurance company, Intact Insurance is certainly on top of the game when it comes to digitization and technology solutions. This empathy campaign is certainly not a dig at digital. Rather it’s about choice and offering consumers the best experience through whichever channel they choose to do business, Monniere explained.
“There are ways to put empathy in every touch point or relationship with an insurance company,” he added. “Empathy can be offered at claim time, upon purchase, at renewal time and even in the more technological aspects like telematics. It’s our aim to craft this campaign into all of the different touch points a customer can have with an insurer.”
