CAN WE EVER ENJOY A HASSLE-FREE INSURANCE CLAIM PROCESS?
We are in an era where most insurers have adopted a lot of innovative activities towards simplifying the insurance claims process. Some insurers have tried to reduce the number of days it takes to pay claims by paying claims within a certain amount limit within 72 hours while others are even paying within 24 hours when all necessary documents are submitted.
Notwithstanding all these innovative ideas, why do people who have paid for insurance prefer to repair their damaged vehicles by themselves? Those who have damaged other people’s property prefer to pay for them than notifying their insurers to pay. Most policyholders do the third-party motor insurance just to satisfy the legislation.
Others who do comprehensive insurance to cover their vehicles sometimes prefer to repair and pay for minor damages on their vehicles instead of going through the claims process. I have met a man who is taking care of a lady because his vehicle knocked her down. He could have reported this to his insurers but think his option taken is more comfortable. He was not sure and did not trust the process. Most of these people believe the claim process is cumbersome and it takes time and additional resources to complete it. The claim process is still difficult even though most insurers are still looking for innovative ways to simplify the process for insures.
To give a customer quality service in terms of claims, there are two dimensions, made up of “output” and “process”. The output has to do with the actual outcome and the process has to deal with the step-by-step sequence of activities before the outcome. Insurance is a means to bring the insured to its original economic position after he has suffered an insurable loss. Insurance gives this assurance. This is the impression created in the mind of the insuring public. People are paid an amount that does not place them on the same financial level they were before the loss occurred because of certain terms and conditions and principles of insurance. But this actual outcome of claims would be looked at on a different date. The process aspect of claims or the step-by-step procedures to make a claim is being looked at now. Insures are very keen on how this assurance given by insurers is being delivered. Most of these policyholders have welfare groups they joined. They are very comfortable contributing to the pool because they know they will not be required to go through a cumbersome process to get their compensation.
The National Insurance Commission have published the claims guidelines. By going through the guidelines, it is not supposed to take more than a month to pay a legitimate claim. But the case is different on the ground. The process as published by the NIC is:
This process does not have to take a policyholder more than a month to claim. One main reason why insurers are finding it difficult to simplify their claims process is that they rely heavily on other national institutions like the Police Service, Judicial Service, The Fire Service, Medical Service Providers, and The Driver and Vehicle Licensing Authority. No one can downplay the role these institutions play in the work of insurance companies. But, should all these companies fail policyholders, insurers should not. They should continue to find better ways to meet policyholder’s expectations.
In most cases, there are two sides of claimable events which are the criminal and the civil aspect. Insurers are usually concerned with the civil aspect. For instance, driver ‘A’ knocks pedestrian ‘B’ with his vehicle insured with insurer ‘C’. The state would prove further whether the driver did it intentionally or it was purely accidental. But the insurer should not wait for that before it takes up its civil aspect which is clear that, the driver whether intentionally or accidentally hit the pedestrian. Some insurers would wait for the court proceedings even if it has to take years to conclude the criminal aspect before they compensate the victim(s).
Furthermore, some insurers would intentionally and as a strategy to delay payment insist on a final policy report for a case pending in court. Until the court concluded the case, the Police would also not be able to issue the final police report.
Again, what is the point of paying for instance GHS 800.00 for a medical report to claim a Workmen Compensation benefit of GHS500.00? And also, a driver damages another vehicle belonging to someone else to the sum of GHS 1,000.00. Before he can claim this amount, he needs a police report which he has to pay for and also take the vehicle for testing to pay as well. These institutions would also not use few days to resolve this. He has to spend days and energy to get these done. Insurers are not able to simplify their claim processes partly because of this reliance.
Insurers can overcome the power of relying heavily on these institutions by getting “very close to their policyholders”. They should be the first to know whatever happens to their policyholders or clients.
Another way is to build the capacity of their staff to perform the particular duty they want from these institutions. The work performed by the police, fire service and the DVLA testing could be done by in–house staff if they are well trained and insurers are seeing this as one of the impediments to pay claims and bring back the confidence and trust to the insuring public.
Insurers should take advantage of new technologies like WhatsApp and others where policyholders can easily notify their insurers by sending pictorial or video evidence of events when they happen to them wherever they might be. Safe the industry now or never!!!!!
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