U.S. consumers prefer local branches for home & auto insurance
Outside of filing a claim, 32% of policyholders don’t hear from their insurance company on an annual basis.
When it comes to seeking coverage for a vehicle or home, U.S. consumers prefer to work through a local insurance branch, according to research from Duck Creek Technologies, which also reported Canadian policyholders show a propensity for brokers when buying vehicle and critical illness plans.
Nearly half of U.S. policyholders surveyed said they prefer a local branch when seeking home contents or buildings policies, while 35% worked through a broker and 35% bought directly from an insurance provider. For car, van and motorbike policies, 59% of U.S. consumers favor local branches, compared with 28% that went through a broker and 39% who bought direct, according to Duck Creek.
The trend of favoring brokers was more pronounced in Canada, where 31% placed a car, van or motorbike policy through a broker, while 23% of those seeking home contents/building coverage turned to brokers. Direct from an insurance provider and through a local branch were leveraged by less than 10% of consumers for both lines, according to Duck Creek.
This makes policyholders in the two countries outliers, as the overwhelming majority of global consumers said they prefer to buy directly from insurance providers across all policy types. However, more than 25% of all purchases were completed via brokers or other third parties, Duck Creek reported, noting this shows the importance of distribution management to the P&C insurance sector.
All quiet on the home front
Except when filing a claim, 32% of consumers worldwide said they don’t hear on an annual basis from their insurance providers, Duck Creek reported.
This trend stands out most for home insurance, with 35% of consumers saying they never hear from their home insurance company and an equal amount report hearing just once a year. Just 11% have communication with the company twice annually. For motor policyholders, 29% of policyholders said they never get communications from their insurer, while 36% get one per year and 17% said they hear twice a year.
However, this engagement level isn’t leaving policyholders feeling neglected. A majority (68%) feel their insurer treats them as an individual and 69% agree with the statement: “My insurance company cares about its customers.”
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