Is automation the key to solving insurers’ most pressing challenges? Explore conversational AI, RPA and other forms of insurance automation here.
Artificial intelligence (AI) in the insurance market is projected to reach a value of $40.1 billion USD in 2030, at a compound annual growth rate of 32.6%. And for good reason: AI is poised to completely transform the insurance industry, replacing inefficient manual and often paper-based processes with advanced technology — in particular, insurance automation.
The state of the insurance industry in 2023
The insurance industry isn’t exactly known for its fast and efficient processes. Whether applying for a new policy or filing a claim, customers have become accustomed to waiting a few days — at best — to hear a response. But today’s insurance customers are no longer content with the status quo and have shown that they’re willing to change insurance carriers if they fail to receive timely and adequate service.
In order to meet these new expectations, insurance companies need to optimize back-end operations. This is no easy feat, given the complexity of certain processes and the ongoing talent shortage within the industry. And that’s without accounting for emerging industry trends. From the need to achieve sustainable growth to demand for personalized products, insurance companies must find innovative ways to evolve and thrive in this changing environment — and intelligent automation could be the key.
What is insurance automation (and why does it matter)?
Insurance automation represents a specialized application of intelligent automation designed to address the unique requirements of the insurance sector. Intelligent automation encompasses the utilization of AI, machine learning (ML), and process automation not only for the automation of manual tasks but also for the continuous enhancement of these processes through advanced data science techniques.
In an industry overrun by inefficient, paper-based processes, insurance automation has the ability to save time and effort, effectively transforming both the customer and employee experiences. For an example of this, look no further than conversational AI. Conversational AI is a popular form of intelligent automation that uses natural language processing (NLP and natural language understanding (NLU) and deep learning to interpret and comprehend human language and formulate responses.
Although the technology behind conversational AI is sophisticated, the general concept is fairly straightforward. Insurance companies can leverage conversational AI to create virtual agents and assistants capable of providing internal and external support.
Insurance companies can use multiple forms of intelligent automation together. For example, conversational AI can integrate with robotic process automation (RPA) to expand its potential use cases. RPA is a form of business process automation that enables insurers to automate repetitive tasks based on a predefined set of instructions.
When used in conjunction with conversational AI, RPA enhances the capabilities of virtual agents and assistants, enabling them to answer common queries, gather information, analyze documents, generate quotes and even offer personalized product recommendations to policyholders.
Intelligent automation has the power to solve many of the challenges insurers face today, from tedious, paper-based claims processing to long wait times for customer support — and that’s just scratching the surface.
6 use cases for automation in insurance
The possibilities for intelligent automation in the insurance industry are numerous — but here are some sample use cases to get started:
- Customer service: Insurance companies can supplement their human workforce with artificially intelligent virtual agents, enhancing efficiency in the process. But that’s not all: Insurers can also use intelligent automation to process unstructured data and automatically generate detailed customer profiles. Virtual assistants can then access these profiles and present them to live representatives so that they have a complete view of policyholders when they field inquiries.
- Customer onboarding: Insurers can leverage conversational AI to create onboarding assistants that guide new customers through the onboarding process, automating data intake and setting them up with policies. These onboarding assistants can integrate with existing policy systems so that customer data is automatically populated within those systems, creating detailed and accurate customer records.
- Claims processing: Claims processing can be tedious, as it requires insurance agents to manually collect documents and verify information. This manual approach can also leave room for human error, which can further delay the process. Insurance companies can use RPA, as well as other forms of intelligent automation, to automate the entire claims workflow, from intake to assessment to settlement.
- Underwriting: Using NLP and NLU-powered text analytics, virtual agents can consolidate and analyze data from multiple sources to assess risk. Underwriters can then leverage this analysis to determine whether a customer qualifies for a policy, how much coverage they’re eligible for and how much their monthly premium will be.
- Policy management: Insurance automation takes the complexity out of policy management by automating the policy issuance workflow and sending out automated policy renewal alerts. Insurers can also create virtual policy management assistants to walk customers through the process of updating or renewing their policy.
- Regulatory compliance: The regulatory landscape for the insurance industry is complex and constantly changing. Maintaining compliance often requires redesigning entire business processes, and these changes can sometimes be difficult for employees to keep up with. Insurance companies can set their agents up for success by using virtual assistants to guide them through process changes. Companies can also use insurance automation to set and screen compliance alerts, validate customer data and generate regulatory reports, all in support of compliance.
8 ways businesses can benefit from intelligent automation in insurance
The future is bright for insurance companies that implement intelligent automation technology such as conversational AI and RPA. Expected benefits include:
- Greater operational efficiency: Automating important, yet time-consuming tasks has the power to streamline operations across the organization. Insurance automation also frees up team leads to support staff with higher value tasks, lowering operating costs and improving employee engagement.
- More engaged employees: Speaking of engagement, one of the chief benefits of insurance automation technology such as conversational AI is that it can help employees be more effective. Virtual assistants are always on and at the ready to answer employee inquiries and offer targeted recommendations, so live agents can do their jobs with confidence.
By removing menial tasks and allowing employees to engage with work that requires critical and even creative thinking, insurance companies can increase their impact. This has the net effect of keeping employees engaged, interested in the work they do and motivated to excel. - Better customer experiences: Rather than wait in long queues to be connected to a live representative, insurance automation delivers instant support to customers in the form of virtual agents. These agents — powered by conversational AI and RPA — can handle most front-line inquiries and automatically escalate issues to live agents where appropriate.
On the back end, insurance automation fast-tracks historically slow processes such as claims processing and policy management, further reducing customer wait times. With greater efficiency comes a better customer experience, which can lead to increased customer satisfaction and long-term loyalty. - Increased scalability: By streamlining both front- and back-end operations, intelligent automation enables insurers to scale their services without dramatically increasing headcount — yet another cost-saving opportunity. Conversational AI, RPA and other forms of insurance automation enable companies to meet increased customer demand and web traffic volumes with virtual agents, all while leveraging their existing teams more effectively.
- Advanced fraud detection: Fraud is a growing problem for insurers, with the Federal Bureau of Investigation placing the total cost of insurance fraud at over $40 billion per year. Fortunately, insurance companies can combat this threat with conversational AI, RPA and other forms of intelligent automation.
Here’s how it works: Virtual agents are able to recognize patterns in conversations and can be trained to identify potential social engineering attacks. If a virtual agent recognizes an attempt at social engineering, it can use RPA to send an automated alert to an insurance company’s cybersecurity team, which can step in to resolve the issue. - Improved data accuracy: Insurance automation not only saves valuable time, it can also improve data accuracy. Manual processes are prone to human error, especially when it comes to data entry. Poor data quality can cause multiple issues, from delaying the claims process and slowing customer payments to preventing insurers from pricing policies accurately and making data-driven business decisions. By automating the data collection process, intelligent automation eliminates the risk of human error.
- Optimized data collection and processing: In addition to automating data collection, insurers can also automate data processing, which takes raw, unstructured data and prepares it for analysis. Once again, automating this process saves time, reduces the risk of human error and improves data quality to drive more informed decision-making.
- Seamless system integrations: Many intelligent automation offerings integrate directly with insurance companies’ existing systems to optimize business processes. For example, boost.ai’s conversational AI integrates with instant messaging platforms such as Slack and WhatsApp, live chat platforms such as Zendesk and Salesforce, and authentication programs such as Signicat and OpenID to create seamless user experiences.
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Boost.ai delivers conversational AI at scale for insurance companies around the world. Contact us today to find out how you can streamline processes, engage customers and provide world-class support, all through intelligent automation.
Discover the Full Potential of Intelligent Automation in Insurance
Learn about the transformative power of insurance automation and develop strategies for using intelligent automation in today’s economic environment in this on-demand webinar, hosted by boost.ai in partnership with Lydonia Technologies and UIPath. Watch It Now