In our video interview, Vohra, regional managing director for Solera, details the results of its consumer, insurer and repairer research on artificial intelligence and claims technology.
In February, Solera released results of a study of over 1600 consumer, insurance and repairer respondents on how digital technologies such as artificial intelligence and self-service claims apps are being implemented and received. One key finding was that nearly three-quarters of consumers, at 72%, desired a fully automated claims process.
In our video interview embedded below, Atul Vohra, regional managing director for Solera, details the results of the consumer research as well as the journey the insurers and repairers are on to employ technology to improve and expand their operations.
Commenting on the headline statistic on consumer acceptance of automated claims technology, that while seeing the statistic might be surprising, it should be expected given the digital experiences consumers experience in their lives each day.
“It’s amazing. With hindsight, we should have expected it after what I just described, but it’s amazing to see the readiness from a consumer point of view,” said Vohra. ” In total. And we found that 72% of the consumers surveyed wanted a fully automated AI claims process. Let’s step back and let me repeat that. And then I’ll give you some breakout findings for North America, where we are both a resident right now. 72%, that’s almost three out of four. And when you add to it the North America study, where we found 83% of claimants said they would trust an AI-driven claims journey. Now, that, to me, is just a remarkable statistic.”
Vohra, who earlier in his career worked at Citibank during the time when online banking was being introduced, compared that relatively slow experience to the state of transformation on auto insurance claims.
“We are at the tipping point where 83% of consumers would trust an AI-driven process. And as I say, when I lived through the banking [transformation], I worked at Citibank, and we did this, it was more than a decade long process. So, this is an incredible point in time. It’s very exciting,” said Vohra. ” In our survey, what we found was, two thirds of the consumers surveyed suggested that they would actually change insurers in order to gain a faster and simpler claims engagement process. So, it’s a clarion call for all of us. Number one, the consumer is ahead of us. They’re ready, they’re willing, they trust the process. And if we don’t provide it to them, they’ll go to someone else who does.”
Vohra believes the results are driven by consumers’ desire for the types of streamlined digital interactions in the claim process that they experience every day as a consumer, asking, “When was the last time you actually went to see a teller in a bank? When was the last time you actually got a boarding card printed by an agent when we were flying?”
“But anytime we have a claim, we still have been going through the same process. So, the consumer has been crying out for help,” said Vohra.
Vohra cited Solera’s experience with the self-service claim smartphone app they have been private labelling for insurers for the last several years that saw increasing usage prior to the pandemic that increased substantially since then.
Beyond consumer attitudes, Solera’s research also examined insurer and collision repairer attitudes towards technology, and customer acceptance.
“Beyond the impact of COVID, which was obviously the highest-ranking response trigger for insurers at 47%, employee safety, remote working and removing physical touch points from the process came next at 37% and 33%,” said Vohra. “The need for a touchless claims experience is paramount in insurers’ mindset and decision matrix. So, that’s clearly very, very important to them.”
Vohra also detailed how Solera maps insurers’ journey implementing claims technology based upon the size of the claim where smaller claims can be handled in a touchless process and where medium and heavy repairable claims can benefit from triage using digital technology.
In its research across collision repair facility operators, Vohra explained that body shops already see customers making decisions based upon the repair facility’s digital capability.
“One of the top pressure points for them, 37% of body shops said that customers make selections on which body shop to engage with based on the shop’s digital readiness,” said Vohra. “So, they understand this is not just about getting more efficient. It’s an existential situation. If they’re not digitally ready, consumers will vote with their feet. Insurers will vote with their allocation methodologies. And so, it’s a very competitive market. Consumers are ready, consumers are demanding it. And the smart shops are right there with them. And the reason the smart shops want to go in the same direction is very similar. It improves cycle time. It gets their customers back on the road faster. And frankly, what happens here is, it provides them a consistent and more accurate methodology. The issue that AI scores over human all the time is inconsistency.”
Vohra explained that a key goal is to eliminate inconsistency and help employees improve predictability and efficiency, particularly given the long-term concern over technician and management employee availability.
“You can get the most expert appraisers, and get three of them to look at the same car, and you will get three different estimates. It’s the nature of the human being. Now, our tools bring them as close together as possible,” said Vohra. “Once you inject AI-based decision-making into our tools, now, you have a consistent answer. So, shops want consistency, shops want predictability and speed, and this is what it gives them.”
“We have a situation where there’s a skills gap. We’re just not training as many technicians as we were 10 years ago. And certainly, less than we were 15 years ago and 20 years ago,” said Vohra. “What AI is able to do is de-skill some jobs. Essentially, the shops can do more with less. And that’s why the shops are absolutely ready. This is one of those perfect situations of trifecta, if you will, where the consumer wants it, the insurers want it, and the shops want it. And all for very similar reasons.”