Hiscox aiming to enhance customer service with AI

Hiscox is aiming to leverage technology such as artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance customer service beyond current standards.

That was according to Chris Loake, group chief information officer at Hiscox, who explained to Insurance Times that in order to serve its customers “better”, Hiscox needed to have the “right data, the right tools and the right partners”.

He continued to explain that this would then enable the insurer to “swiftly test hypotheses then implement solutions in a highly robust and resilient way”.

Loake made the comment after Hiscox teamed up with Google Cloud to create an artificial intelligence (AI) model for the London market that can automate the core underwriting process for specialist risks.

Hiscox claimed the new model would be the first of its kind and could reduce the time for lead open-market quotes from three days to three minutes.

To do this, it will leverage both Google Cloud’s BigQuery and Vertex AI platform – as well as Hiscox’s digital technologies –to extract key data and insights from email submissions.

Kate Markham, chief executive of London market at Hiscox, said the model was still being developed and that she was “looking forward” to progressing the project in 2024.

Implementation

AI has become more popular in recent years, with large language models such as ChatGPT piquing the interest of many.

For example, in March 2023, Zurich said that it was experimenting with ChatGPT as it explored how it could use the technology for tasks such as extracting data for claims and modelling.

More recently, on 9 October 2023, Sedgwick said it had been using artificial intelligence (AI) to enhance the claims experience for customers.

However, Nicholas Robert, emerging risks modeller at Lloyd’s, previously told Insurance Times that, when it came to AI, “optimism should be tempered with awareness of the risks it poses for transparency, ethics, security and safety”.

Robert explained that the industry needed to consider “mitigating the risks” when exploring how “rapidly changing technologies can be applied”.

Iryna Chekanava, senior manager at Lloyd’s Lab, echoed Roberts’ comments as she explained to Insurance Times that the opportunities with AI “stem largely from imagining an ideal and fair scenario”.

“[However], the challenges broadly come from implementing the technology before we’ve fully understood its potential, or without have a clear plan for its use in place,” Chekanava said.