Rob works in the underwriting department of a large auto insurance company. Rob’s primary job is to compile driving records and related reports so that underwriters can evaluate them for new policy holders. This job includes accessing multiple systems, websites and data from different channels and service providers. Once the date is collected, Rob enters this data into his company’s systems so that underwriters can analyze it. Typically, an employee would work on this for 8 hours a day dealing with multiple disparate systems, processes and workflows. However, Rob can do this 24X7 resulting in reduced processing time and cost.

Robotic Process Automation (RPA) in Insurance 

What makes Rob productive?

Rob is a software powered by RPA which leverages intelligent business rules to automate repeatable and predictable tasks. Rob is able to perform the core part of the Underwriting process which is data collection in seconds. This in turn is freeing up Rob’s human co-workers to focus more on providing personalized customer experiences and other critical business activities.

Applications like “Rob” are getting increasingly adopted across the Insurance industry. From data gathering to data validation to real-time recommendations, the “virtual underwriters” driven by RPA are faster and more accurate. With RPA insurers can overcome some of the common challenges like manual data gathering from different type of application formats and channels, pre-scoring applicant, avoiding missing information etc.

Intelligent Automation for Smarter Underwriting

Taking RPA to the next level in Insurance are the new age cognitive technologies, Artificial Intelligence (AI) and Machine Learning (ML). With predictive analytics, insurers can help their customers manage risks better and avoid losses and become risk advisers and mitigators. By combining AI, ML and RPA, insurers can manage policy inquiries and application processes faster and more accurately. Smart Automation can also help insurance companies enhance their customer service by improving digital marketing and sales services across all digital channels. Digital assistants with in-built Natural Language Processing capabilities are able to resolve complex customer inquiries and provide the best-fit solution. Trained underwriters supported by smart data analysis and decision-making systems will be able to provide higher values to their customers and improve cross-selling.

From building PoCs and use cases to enterprise-wide automation solutions, insurers have already started taking RPA to the next level. One of the key reasons being the immediate business benefits that they achieve in terms of effort and cost reduction. Most insurers who have implemented RPA in some way or the other see a positive Return of Investment in the very first year.

•      A leading life insurance provider automated 97% of its underwriting process using an automated & scalable Underwriting Decision Engine (UDE) built on RPA.
•      A fortune 250 American insurer has drastically cut costs by automating third-party data analysis.
•      One of the leading auto insurance firms in Europe has improved its sales force productivity by building intelligent systems with automated underwriting capabilities.

Conclusion

With RPA, insurance firms will surely gain an enormous competitive advantage. Reduced processing costs, better operational efficiency, and a higher level of customer service are just a few of the benefits of implementing RPA. Implementing RPA and intelligent automation is certainly not a simple step. It will require insurers to re-imagine and redefine their business models, underlying processes and IT architectures. However, the benefits for companies that quickly grab this opportunity are likely to be substantial and significant.

By,

Supratim Chakraborty,

Sr. Consultant – Marketing, RapidValue

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