The future of accident management: Merging human expertise with AI
AI holds great promise for increasing efficiency and reducing costs in the industry, but must support the human aspects of accident management.
An estimated 35 million vehicle repairs are carried out after collisions in Europe alone every year. Working with an accident manager can help turn long, frustrating vehicle claim and repair processes into easy fixes.
Traditionally, insurers have leaned on accident management companies to help handle influxes of claims and offload the complex, resource-intensive management of post-accident logistics, repairs, and customer service. However, these firms don’t just focus on financial compensation; they also strive to provide customers peace of mind and trust. Accident managers can help streamline the claims process, provide expert legal compensation insights, and ensure drivers quickly resume their everyday lives.
For insurers, outsourcing accident management is a strategy that can provide a smoother, more efficient way to resolve claims, especially related to car accidents. The global automotive collision repair market is set to reach $219.58 billion by 2030, with some of the highest demand in the European region. As the industry continues to grow, we are starting to see how technology like artificial intelligence (AI) can help remove the complexities in accident management even further.
Outsourcing accident management: Tapping into human expertise
Outsourcing accident claims management isn’t just about saving money – it’s also about making the most of human expertise. Companies that specialize in managing accident claims excel at organizing the right resources and people needed to handle various claims, reducing insurers’ risk. For the policyholders making a claim, this means faster claim handling, more organized car repairs, and often a courtesy car to make the accident aftermath less of a hassle.
It’s also important to note that as vehicle technologies advance and parts become more complex, the need for skilled repair work is growing. Accident management companies must also adapt to these advancements and continuously improve their ability to offer quality support after an accident.
Merging human expertise with AI
Visual intelligence, an advanced computer vision AI, can help accident management companies meet new demands and improve their processes in several ways. With visual intelligence, accident managers can identify and analyze vehicle damage with incredible accuracy, complementing what the human eye can achieve in terms of providing a detailed assessment.
Using visual intelligence, the insured can take photos or videos of the damage to his vehicle and the technology makes an immediate inspection, providing the expert with a pre-assessment of the damaged parts, their severity, their repair cost, and a recommendation of next steps. By merging human industry expertise with AI, accident managers can achieve incredible efficiency and accuracy when it comes to determining vehicle repair costs and timelines. It gives them much more information to leverage to make decisions and move forward with the case, so they can manage many more cases at the same time.
Another area where AI can make a big difference is dealing with claims-related paperwork, which can often be a major hassle for all parties involved. By automating the documentation process, accident managers can reduce errors, catch important insurance conditions or restrictions, and help speed up claim submissions. This also helps to mitigate potential disputes and leads to quicker claim validations and resolutions.
AI can also play an essential role in customer service. By providing real-time support via AI chatbots, which can respond to a wide range of policyholder demands and questions, accident managers can give customers more peace of mind during stressful times. Again, the point isn’t to replace human interaction but rather enhance it with a reliable, constant, and accurate support system.
A new era of accident management
A recent New York Times article focused on the ever-increasing costs in the vehicle collision repair industry, highlighted the average costs of repairs have continued to rise, around 36% since 2018, leading insurance premiums to rise along with them. According to a recent S&P Global Market Intelligence analysis, premiums rose $7.4 billion during Q1 2023 to $76.3 billion, compared to the $68.83 billion of premiums written during Q1 2022.
AI holds great promise for increasing efficiency and reducing costs in the industry; however, this can only be achieved by incorporating the technology in a way that improves and supports the human aspects of accident management. There is a massive opportunity to combine human expertise with AI to transform complex vehicle claims and repair processes and provide vehicle owners with a more streamlined, accurate, and trustworthy experience.
Julio Pernía Aznar is the CEO of Bdeo, a technology company that provides proprietary ‘visual intelligence’ technology to insurance and fleet companies across Europe, Latin America, and Africa.