AMP simplifies risk insurance process
AMP has introduced an automated risk insurance system to help streamline the application process by requiring consumers to potentially provide information in regard to risk cover only once.
According to AMP director of product manufacturing Craig Meller, the new ‘easywrite’ system has been designed to ensure the right questions are asked and answered at the right time so customers can receive the cover most appropriate to their needs.
“Previously, the paper-based application forms were very iterative, with underwriting departments having to go back and forth to planners and customers to ask more questions. Easywrite allows the planner and customer to answer most of these questions on the spot, or at a customer’s convenience via the telephone,” he said.
The automated system incorporates 261 high level rules and 5,600 questions and is based on software that has been established already in the US and UK markets.
The new process also allows planners to take a particular answer and drill down on it to establish a more comprehensive client history.
“In the past, a person may have had to have a medical visit or had their application investigated by an underwriter after answering ‘yes’ to a family history of cancer. Easywrite could drill down to discover that this cancer was a generation ago and was not hereditary and the application could be automatically accepted,” Meller explained.
AMP anticipates the new system will allow over 50 per cent of risk insurance applications to be automatically accepted resulting in more policies being issued on the spot.
Currently, 35 AMP financial planning practices have access to easywrite.
To complement these practices AMP has also set up a facility called ‘easywrite tele’ for those people whose planner is not already using the new system, or feel more comfortable completing the process via telephone.
“Australians are chronically underinsured, so anything AMP can do to make the process of applying for insurance easier is a step in the right direction,” Meller said.
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