David Williams, non-executive director and Consumer Duty champion at Qlaims, discusses the need for the insurance industry to recognise the vital importance of the claims experience to customers
Speaking with brokers at the recent Biba conference and through my other exchanges, it seems the common view is, sadly, that the industry’s claims service is still not where it needs to be.
Other businesses, even insurance companies in some aspects, have embraced the digital age. But when it comes to customer claims service, we seem to have gone backwards.
Strangely, claims feel less important than they were a few years ago – back then, the industry had claims managing directors on main boards. Now I hear reference to back office, admin and claims being just a part of the chief operating officer’s remit.
Whilst most aspects of insurance are cyclical, claims need to quickly become front of mind again.
I’d imagined that most claims grumbles and complaints would be about the level of settlement and accusations of insurers penny pinching, but that doesn’t seem to be the case.
In fact, research commissioned by Qlaims showed that less than 10% of the reasons for claims dissatisfaction actually stem from the settlement itself.
Claim complexity
Anyone who’s had a claim – and particularly when we are talking larger or complex claims – will know that there are many parties involved. This is confusing for customers at a time that can be incredibly stressful.
While I’m sure the customer is at the heart of everyone’s best intentions we, as an industry, fall short over and over again in their eyes.
We need to up our game and do better. We need to reduce the unnecessary duplication and delays, share more and focus less on what suits our individual organisational processes and more on what the customer expects and needs.
Insurers’ approach to claims often involves a focus on areas such as supplier utilisation rates, but they can miss the delays caused to customers. And we all know that with claims, delays equal higher indemnity costs.
Research by Qlaims showed that over 50% of customer dissatisfaction resulted from process delays. We also see insurers selecting the cheapest reinstatement quotation and then missing the later scope creep by not holding their supply chain to account.
Consumer Duty is about anticipated customer outcomes. Meeting our customers’ expectations is about collaboration – working together to achieve the correct claim outcome and the one we promised when we sold the policy. It’s not simple with so many parties involved and it’s easy to lose sight of whose loss it was.
Did anyone really think that, when buying their insurance, they’d be responsible for preparing their own claim, or having to chase around multiple parties to try and move things on, deal with unexplained delays or quibble about things they don’t really understand because everyone else is using insurance speak?
I feel that loss recovery insurance and its provision of a claims specialist – a Cila qualified adjuster – to guide the customer through their claim is the right approach.
Claims preparation is a skill and this specialist is uniquely placed to provide the needed cohesion between the parties to enable those better customer outcomes we are all seeking to achieve.
