Inside the insurance industry: Putting customers first during the pandemic
By building strong relationships with customers, insurance firms will be in better shape to handle current risks and the post-pandemic environment to follow.
The pandemic has caused tough times for everyone, including those in the insurance industry. Your firm may have had a policy of putting the customer first, but what that means has evolved due to the COVID-19 pandemic. In the current environment, the principles may be the same, while some practices could be changing. It’s relatively easy to be there for customers during regular times — that’s table stakes for insurance companies. But consistently delivering outstanding service, compassion and flexibility during the long-term in a global crisis is harder.
Here are some pointers to help you adapt to the times.
Understand your customers’ altered financial circumstances
People who are financially suffering may be considering canceling insurance policies. You might be one of the insurers who has provided options for support to customers as per the FCA guidance that directed insurance firms to consider actions for those experiencing financial distress as a result of COVID-19.
Of course, it’s in your interest to help your clients assess their risks and optimize their choices. Doing this may require a lot of listening, as everyone has been touched by the pandemic and may have a different support need; it can also yield useful information for you. During this time, you might need to be more empathic and communicate your company’s collective support to your customers.
You want to know how their situation and their risks have changed and the direction they intend to take in the near future. If your clients consist of firms whose employees are now working mostly at home, you’ll have to explain how workers’ compensation functions when the employees are doing accounting from their couch. You may need to adapt cyber policies as well and make suggestions on how to limit their risks — and yours.
For example, if they are driving much less, perhaps they can reduce their auto premiums by using a pay-as-you-go policy and dropping collision coverage. You might have provided billing relief to U.S. personal auto insurance customers up to a 15-25% credit on their April, May, and June premiums. You could also pause policy cancellations due to non-payment for a certain period, extend payment due dates while continuing to provide coverage, and carry over unpaid balances to the next statement without incurring late fees.
Adapt to service your customers
Many people are spending more time in their homes, either working or not, and they may not have the range of computerized functionality that they would in their offices. This means they may sometimes have difficulty completing a communication or a transaction. For example, requiring printing may not be practical, as customers may not have a home printer. On the other hand, some customers want to have paper copies of everything, and so printing should still be an available option.
You want to make sure that you give your customers several options for completing transactions (i.e., virtual claims), so they can do it quickly and leverage the option that best meets their individual situation. You don’t want to forfeit potential customers because they were hindered by computer problems. Make sure, too, that they can reach a live person, at least during working hours.
If you haven’t already, you must also focus on improving your virtual capabilities to ensure that your business continuity plans, together with virtual tools and technology, enable you to respond quickly, shift work across resources, and manage the capacity to maintain your customer service during this time. This is especially important if you have adapted and taken steps to keep claims adjusters, employees, and customers safe during this time, limiting in-person contact to emergency scenarios only.
Solicit feedback from customers, potential customers
More is happening digitally, especially in these circumstances, so you need to make sure your customers’ experiences are worry-free and discover when they are not.
For example, potential customers who cannot navigate your website may give up before they reach the point where they are giving information and feedback. Others may just not be in the mood to provide feedback and may not bother to fill out a survey. Surveys and comment boxes are useful, but these may not capture what is needed.
It’s important to find ways to collect feedback to inform how best to personalize the support you can provide on a case-by-case basis or to a particular group of customers struggling due to the pandemic. According to Salesforce, 63% of millennials and 58% of Gen X consumers are more than happy to share their data with companies to obtain personalized offers and information.
Share examples, actionable client insights within your firm
Without the casual encounters at the office coffee maker, you have to keep the communication going within the firm. You should schedule conversations among those who deal with customers so that your employees can share what they’ve discovered. Note that over-competitiveness can hinder information sharing; you want a culture where sharing is rewarded. If some employees are intimidated by large meetings, make sure they participate in smaller sessions.
A discussion of clients’ problems can lead to solutions for customers and opportunities for your firm. You may discover you need to offer policies with higher deductibles or endorsements for liability in a shared parking lot. Your firm may need to change course and move people within the organization to take advantage of shifting trends.
Change procedures to keep the customer first
Putting the customer first should be more than a slogan, especially during the pandemic and working virtually. As Jeff Bezos once said, “If you make customers unhappy in the physical world, they might each tell six friends. If you make customers unhappy on the Internet, they can each tell 6,000.”
When a new procedure is working, it may be time to make it company policy. Also, you should reward employees who manage these things well, with praise, recognition, positive performance reviews, and even money.
By building strong relationships with your customers, your firm will be in better shape to handle the current set of risks in the world and the post-pandemic environment to follow.
Priya Merchant (priya.merchant.writing@gmail.com) is a digital transformation and innovation expert with nearly two decades of experience in financial services and insurance. The views expressed here are the author’s own.
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