Advancing The Hybrid

ADVANCING THE HYBRID WORKFORCE IN THE INSURANCE INDUSTRY

AI is said to be redefining how customers interact with insurance providers, and according to research, this rings true. As far back as 2017, 80% of insurers in the UK and Ireland anticipated making moderate or extensive investments in deep learning, embedded AI solutions and machine learning over the next three years.

While the UK has a way to go in catching up with the US and China when it comes to AI investment in insurance, it’s clear this is an area we can expect to grow rapidly. We know that excellent customer service lies at the heart of good insurance services, it’s not surprising companies wants to invest in new technologies that drive innovation for both customers and employees’ experiences.

Today, amidst unprecedented and sudden challenges that have upended industries relying heavily on insurance, it is perhaps unsurprising that many are already looking to AI-powered digital employees and investing in cognitive solutions to upgrade and scale customer-facing processes. At the same time, given the nature of the insurance industry, licenced agents play a critical role in being able to legally perform certain functions – calling for a more blended AI-human solution, or a hybrid workforce. So, where can AI be implemented to transform processes and improve operational efficiency and customer service within insurance firms, and how does this affect how licenced experts employed in the insurance sector operate?

Streamlining the customer journey

Insurance firms want to make the customer experience of their contact centres as seamless as possible. So, many have chosen to integrate AI at the beginning of the customer journey to help authenticate users and identify the intent of enquiries. For example, a digital employee can confirm the routine information, such as asking “What is your name and policy number?” or “In a few words, describe what we can help you with today?” and get the customer in front of the right agent from the outset. This again allows human agents to avoid repetitive, information-gathering tasks, in turn improving the customer experience, saving them huge amounts of time, and helping better manage incoming calls routing.

Empowering your staff to take on more advanced roles

Digital employees, such as Amelia, whose programming can be personalised to match the specific company she works with, use Natural Language Processing (NLP) to automate common customer requirements at scale, while securing backend integrations with an organisation’s specific data management systems. For example, a customer can get immediate answers to questions like, “When is my monthly premium due?” or “How much would it be to add my daughter onto my auto insurance policy?” and leave expert human agents to handle individualised customer needs.

By automating straight forward enquiries, insurers can improve customer satisfaction rates by empowering them to get answers more quickly and efficiently. In turn, employees can instead focus their time on higher-level interactions that are both more rewarding for the employee and beneficial for the business, such as building rapport or handling sensitive enquiries.

Augmenting experience for customers 4 and employees

As well as automating simple tasks, digital employees can also support in augmenting the work of human agents by acting as a ‘whisper agent’. Digital employees can work directly with customer agents by discreetly sharing instant, relevant information with them – hence the term, ‘whisper agent’. This is key for ensuring all customer calls are personalised to reflect the customer’s previous experiences, compliant with the industry’s significant regulatory requirements, and in line with company protocols. Having the relevant information to hand in turn makes the call more seamless for the customer, as employees do not have to spend time searching through databases, policy guidance or FAQ documents.

In this capacity, digital employees can significantly enhance employee satisfaction. By providing staff with instantaneous, on-demand information, human agents can feel safe in the knowledge that they are not only working quickly and efficiently, but that their customer engagements are compliant. McKinsey predicts that future insurance claims will be massively aided by AI when it comes to filing and processing claims. However, humans will still be required in providing emotional support to customers and high-impact, case-by-case expertise that cannot be as easily replicated.

The future of insurance is in the Hybrid Workforce

According to Deloitte estimates, more than 85% of customer interactions are predicted to be managed without a human by the end of this year. The role of insurance agents is changing dramatically, and with it, so are customer expectations. We will see an increasing number of firms adopting a Hybrid Workforce model, in a bid to speed up processes and enhance the customer experience. It will no longer be feasible for organisations to expect customers to wait in long phone queues to get the answer to a simple claim query. AI is causing significant changes and improvements to customer service across nearly all industries - and insurance is no exception. As more and more organisations get onboard with the notion of a Hybrid Workforce, there will be widening divide between the AI-haves and the AI-have-nots.

But it is not just about being ahead of the competition – it is also about being able to scale quickly and flexibly in order to cope with our fluctuating circumstances. Today, more than ever, it is vital that insurers can

manage spikes in customer enquiries.

Stephen Harcup, Cognitive AI Director for Banking, Western Europe at Amelia, an IPsoft company

Source: 1 https://financialservices.accenture.com/rs/368-RMC-681/ images/ai-for-insurance-pov.pdf 2 https://www.ipsoft.com/amelia/ 3 https://www.mckinsey.com/~/media/McKinsey/Featured

Insights/The Next Normal/The-Next-Normal-The-future-ofinsurance https://www2.deloitte.com/content/dam/Deloitte/ru/ Documents/financial-services/artificial-intelligence-ininsurance.pdf