AI proliferation may be staunchly in the spotlight, but the topic of digital trust in today’s insurance landscape extends much further. In part two of Insurance Business’ Corporate Risk interview with Daisy Ning, Swiss Re head of L&H Reinsurance APAC ex. China, she explores how it is also beneficial for important end goals in the customer experience journey as well as its vital role in tackling the ongoing underinsurance/uninsurance trend.
“Digital trust is central to improving customer experience, enhancing productivity, and reducing costs,” Ning said.
“Take our flagship underwriting automation tool, Magnum, for instance. It streamlines risk assessment by eliminating time-consuming manual and paper-driven data processing. As a result, it delivers a seamless experience that caters to customer's’ digital-first needs, with results in minutes.”
She also cited the company’s Digital Health Underwriting Solution, which automates second-level medical data collection and processing and further simplifies and accelerates the underwriting journey. All of these innovations will not be possible without adequate digital trust.
“Digital trust plays a pivotal role in the insurance industry, being essential for successful digital transformation, regulatory compliance, and customer satisfaction,” she said. “It's vital for securely handling sensitive data, maintaining compliance, and fostering enduring customer relationships.”
For Ning, trust “paves the way for innovation with less risk and is a cornerstone in the industry's digital evolution”.
“For customers, digital trust translates into a more seamless, efficient, and personalised experience,” Ning said. “Enhanced underwriting and claims automation lead to quicker response times and expedited claim settlements, significantly boosting customer satisfaction.
“Insights derived from customer and portfolio data further enable us to offer unique and tailored products, enriching customer engagement.”
Swiss Re’s partnerships focus on evolving and refining various models from data, Ning said, with this approach enabling the company to maximise digitalization to offer better insights and analytics and amplify its efficiency. In the end, the most important aspect that this efficiency translates into is a seamless and tailored experience for customers, including the creation of products that further boost engagement.
“We are leveraging data and automation for innovative product development, quicker delivery, and more effective customer engagement in the rapidly expanding APAC region,” Ning said. “Our goal is to foster healthier, more resilient societies.”
The world of today is “data-driven”, according to Ning, and a commitment to digital trust and digitalisation offers opportunities to adapt and scale.
“Our guiding principle is to always prioritise customer needs and exceed their expectations, safeguarding their data and providing excellent service,” Ning said. “This customer-centric, progressive approach gives us a competitive edge.”
The power of the internet and its incredible accessibility plays a significant role for insurance, Ning said. This circles back to building digital trust, as the benefit of this further digitalization extends even beyond operation efficiency.
“Digital trust involves data privacy, secure transactions, and transparency in how data is utilised,” she said. “With digital trust, customers are more likely to engage deeply with digital platforms, making it easier for them to understand and purchase insurance products. This engagement narrows the information gap and enables informed decision-making, positively affecting insurance penetration rates.”
For insurance carriers, this means that higher levels of digital trust among a customer base will lead to more openness towards personalised, data-drive policies. Sharing personal data also becomes less of an issue, which also leads to better underwriting results and faster claims processing.
“Moreover, the digitisation prevalent in healthcare sectors means that as electronic health records (e-HRs) become more available, insurers, with proper consent, can streamline access to medical records, optimising both cost and operational efficiency,” Ning said.
“Access to digital platforms and data can also markedly contribute to improved insurance penetration and operational efficiency.”
For example, mobile applications can streamline the process of obtaining insurance by reducing paperwork, making insurance more attractive and accessible to a broader audience.
With proper permissions in place and a sufficient level of trust in the mix, carriers can also harness the data from customers’ online activities that provide insights on segmentation, resulting in more optimised solutions.
“By streamlining this process, it becomes possible to significantly reduce associated costs and expedite approval timelines,” Ning said. “This integration not only drives down expenses for insurers but also propels efficiency, offering customers faster response times and a more refined user experience.”
Looking to the future, Ning said she believed that both the healthtech and insurance sectors can foster deeper collaborations to access medical data, all made possible by digital trust. That said, Ning did have a few parting words, going back to the old adage of how easier it is to lose trust than to gain it.
“It's essential to note that the enhanced access to data comes with the responsibility to maintain strict data security measures,” she said. “Any lapse in this area could undermine the very trust that digitisation aims to build. Insurers must guard against risks such as data breaches, unauthorised data usage, and compliance violations to sustain digital trust.”
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