AKA My and the Insurance/Banking industry’s simultaneous biggest problem and opportunity
AKA What #insurtech should be trying to solve but outside of me and maybe some people I have not found yet, is not.
Really it is two paragraphs. One that comes from a standard document that you’ll find in your policy forms. Yes, I know you likely do not read them. Also, the version in your state may be different. The other is a direct quote via an email. I see or hear variations of the second one every week. So here goes;
In connection with this insurance, we previously used a credit report or obtained or used a credit based insurance score based on information contained in that report. We may obtain or use credit information again provided, however, that upon renewal such information may only be used to reduce premiums. An insurance score uses information from your credit report to help predict how often you are likely to file claims and how expensive those claims will be. Typical items from a credit report that could affect a score include, but are not limited to, the following; payment history, number of revolving accounts number of new accounts, the presence of collection accounts,bankruptcies, and foreclosures. The information used ot develop the insurance sore comes from Transunion. If you have any questions about the use of credit information in insurance underwriting, you can contact us at 1-800-***-**** or write us at p.o. box______________ or via fax at 877-***-****, When you write us, please include your name and policy number.
Here are a series of questions I am pondering;
So when negotiating for this right, did companies really just build in a “backdoor” to cover them if it didn’t work? Think about it; if this was so accurate why do they reserve the right to raise your rates after claims?
Is this really a “customer centric”approach?
Why don’t they actively use this awesome tool to retain you as a customer?
Depending on what blog or newsletters you read, depending on who you follow, depending on who you work with/for you’ll catch almost the “excuse of the week” when it comes to fixing the personal insurance marketplace. The saturation point of unexecuted thoughts and ideas has been reached a long time ago. I prefer things much simpler; acquire customers, take care of them, keep them. By keep them I mean BY ALMOST ANY MEANS NECESSARY. I like to think I follow a good cross section of people/companies. Yet they all see to alternate what the excuse is for not being able to help the customer. So many are focused on new business and will spend whatever time and money necessary to get it but most overlook what they have already. Silly and sad…..but creates an awesome opportunity.
2. “Billy,
Why would the rate go up 50$ shouldn’t it decrease over time? No tickets, no accidents… Is there anyway to lower the rate? It just doesn’t sound kosher that the rate they want now would be more then the initial payment with XYZ, then the second payment decreased to around 680$ which I’m fine with… “
Quick Back story for you insurance people; came to me as uninsured, single, male. I was thrilled with the rate he obtained. Then, for the next six months his rate went down, then after that period his rate went up. In the meantime, as I do, I checked my markets to see if anything better was available. His rate, although inexplicable raised, was still the best I could offer.
His logic is completely sound. This is, sadly, the once accepted but should no longer be acceptable, norm. This method of doing business is exactly what is allowing newer companies to come in and try and “disrupt” and old system. Crap like this is why your agent might be pounding you with a useless newsletter or article. This kind of behavior is not considered acceptable in any of your other buying experiences, why do we as a society allow it to continue?
The short answer is I don’t…but more often than not am outnumbered. The odds are long, but the payoff is massive. Based on my(my company’s) growth rate, people like the way I do business. But currently we come up short with technology and people power and to not bore you with analogies, it’s just tough.
Take from this what you want. I gain more answers and fine tune things almost daily. Almost daily I am also inundated with silly reports and nonsense being pushed by marketers and companies onto my fellow agents. Such is life…currently. I/We keep moving forward. Actually close to a pretty massive move/shift that will greatly accelerate things.
An aside that is sort of related; A long ways back it was a Monday afternoon and a coach was giving us JV’ers a pep talk. During this we watched the other team line up and he pointed out a couple of very large people. He was very quick to point out, if they are so big and bad why are they playing on JV? Yup, simple, profound and very logical.
I think of this after just about every article, white paper or study I read. If the people writing or being quoted know so much about how insurance is bought and sold, maybe they should start their own insurance brokerage or go to work for a broker or company? The reality is things might accelerate if they did.
ONE HUNDRED MILLION or more people will benefit from these changes, would you like to help me?