7 potential benefits for insurers that adopt contact center automation

Insurance contact centers need help now more than ever. Despite the pandemic and ongoing economic uncertainty, Deloitte’s 2022 insurance industry outlook predicts consumer demand for insurance will fuel strong growth in the industry – meaning more pressure on already-stressed contact centers. Insurers are ‘buckling up’ for above-trend premium growth, even as they look for ways to guard against inflation, staffing shortages and rapidly evolving customer preferences. 

As digital innovation continues at the speed of light, insurers are also looking for new technologies to drive efficiency. Combine this scenario with the global labor shortage, and it’s no coincidence that insurance companies are turning to contact center automation to meet demand, improve customer experience, manage call spikes and reduce costs. 

Automation enables insurance providers to resolve common policyholder requests faster and route critical issues to agents more efficiently without having to hire additional staff. Insurers are able to immediately address common policyholder frustrations like poor customer service and price dissatisfaction – both of which are primary reasons why policyholders change providers – leading to cost savings and better customer service outcomes.

1. Improved first contact resolution

First contact resolution (FCR) occurs when a contact center resolves a policyholder’s issue entirely during the initial call, text, or chat conversation. This resolution could mean answering all of a policyholder’s questions, rectifying a problem, or taking a policyholder through the enrollment process in a single conversation. Regardless of the context, FCR means the policyholder doesn’t need to take further steps to resolve their problem. FCR significantly impacts the policyholder’s experience and is an essential contact center performance measurement for every insurance company. 

Some issues insurance companies can typically resolve using automation during a first contact include:

Filing the first notice of loss. The FNOL is the initial report made to the insurance provider after the theft, damage or loss of an asset covered under one’s policy. It’s usually the first step in the formal claims process and includes gathering specific information, such as:

-The date and time of the event
-Location of the incident
-Police report number and information
-Personal or eye-witness account of the event 

The ability to automate and resolve routine policyholder issues, such as FNOL, in a single interaction can provide insurance companies with a distinctive competitive edge. 

Obtaining emergency roadside assistance. When auto insurance policyholders require emergency assistance for a breakdown, a flat tire, or any other problem that has left them stranded on the roadside, a quick resolution is vital. Not only is the driver usually calling from the scene, which suggests limited facilities and potential physical danger, they might also have a critical need to complete their journey with minimal delay. The ability to receive an immediate resolution cannot just improve a policyholder’s experience, it can create a loyal member for life.For example, one insurance provider used automation to increase their capacity to answer all incoming calls without wait times – a critical requirement when urgent issues arise. It even identified members who didn’t have roadside assistance in their policies and passed these upsell opportunities to agents. Automation is helping insurance companies increase revenue, while reducing the amount of upfront work required on behalf of agents.
Performing account and policy management tasks. Updating a policy shouldn’t be difficult. Whether a policyholder needs to provide a new residential address, manage payment options, obtain proof of insurance, or ask a billing question, achieving success upon first contact with automation drives customer satisfaction and frees up agents to focus on more complex requests. Contact center automation also gives policyholders the ability to manage their account after hours and through whichever channel is most convenient to them, further improving their experience.

2. Scale capacity with flexibility

Nobody can predict when a disaster will strike. When it happens, insurance companies must be able to rapidly scale their customer service operations to meet the subsequent increase in policyholder demand. In these unpredictable scenarios, there’s no time to recruit, train and deploy service agents to respond to a crisis. 

By implementing contact center automation, companies lay the foundation for unlimited scale and agility. During a disaster event, managers can quickly reassign experienced agents to high importance problems and infinitely scale up automation to handle straightforward requests, or act as an intake or overflow tool for disaster-related requests. Even during a contact center agent shortage, the ability to scale up or down instantly can transform a company’s reliability. 

3. Deeper data insights

Contact center automation provides a wealth of data that insurance companies can leverage to get deeper insights into their policyholders and operations. Using a combination of conversational AI, machine learning, natural language processing and other technologies, automation can record and transcribe customer service conversations in real-time. 

Analytics can also identify and surface common issues, track call times, and surface other important trends from spoken and typed communications. These insights help predict policyholder behavior, enhance the customer experience and increase operational excellence. 

4. Enhanced customer trust

Decreased customer wait times and improved efficiencies help build trust between an insurance provider and its policyholders by removing guesswork. Enhanced trust reduces misunderstandings between parties and ensures providers follow consistent processes for new applications and claims. Managers can monitor interactions, analyze and review insights produced by conversation data, and effortlessly update scripts to reflect the latest changes. 

This method of operation lowers the risk of human error and bias while reassuring customers that they are getting the same level of service regardless of the channel they use for interaction. Through these methods, contact center automation enables insurers to deliver an optimal customer experience without needing to retrain agents. 

5. Increased customer satisfaction

Automation is transforming customer service as companies in the insurance sector increasingly use it to provide an improved experience for policyholders. According to statistics from Accenture, 66% of insurance companies expect the use of AI to boost the productivity of their workforce and improve their insights. Meanwhile, customers often cite speed and convenience as two of their highest priorities when it comes to service. Fulfilling these promises with automation allows insurers to increase customer satisfaction and retention, save money and increase revenue growth. 

6. Proactive outreach opportunities

Many insurance companies conduct outbound telemarketing, which has been shown to have high success rates and contribute significantly to growth. On the other hand, many insurers also struggle to follow up with prospective customers and lose business when competitors move faster on leads. Contact center automation can help companies drive upsell campaigns based on insights gleaned from the data delivered. It can also immediately reach out to pre-qualify prospective customers faster and increase quote-to-bind rates. Automation can also conduct proactive outreach to follow up with customers after various actions, such as claim filing, processing or information updates. 

7. Faster return on investment

Justifying the costs associated with new technology can be challenging, but an article in RPAToday claims the typical ROI ranges from 500% to 5,000%. When insurance companies adopt contact center automation, they can have a solution up and running in a couple of weeks without having to hire machine learning experts or committing heavy IT resources to a deployment. Contact center automation’s speed of implementation delivers a faster return on investment than any new technology since the introduction of interactive voice response and computer telephony integration in the 1990s.

Now is the time for insurance companies to look into contact center automation, and discover how this technology could give them a clear advantage over their competitors.