Interview Scaling AI in Insurance: A Conversation with Zurich’s Christian Westermann Bain & Company

Although GIS systems have been present in insurance for decades, only the recent development of AI has made the practical use of the big data sets possible. Although the international expansion in insurance is constrained by local regulations, the current technological revolution has already led to an even faster consolidation. The insurance industry has experienced an increased M&A activity in recent years, and AI development as well as the pandemic could increase the trend. “Until there is clarity, transparency around where the models were built, where they were developed or that they had been validated.

When the customer decides on the product, the brokers do a risk assessment and underwriting27. Customer data contained in basic queries such as current claims status, account information, and policy information gets transmitted via chatbots32. Hence, the risk of a security breach or data leak as a result of cyberattacks, such as identity theft, spoofing, tampering, loss of confidentiality, information compromise, denial of service, and information disclosure, exists. Chatbots, built on AI, are evolving as a technology31, which call centres have employed to support brokers. The implemented chatbot aims to improve the call centre agent’s performance by answering client questions, which also helps the organisation deliver a better service than their competitors33. Although there is excitement about adopting these new technologies in the insurance industry, security protection is a significant concern, making insurance companies vulnerable to security breaches such as claims fraud34.

For example, if there were a sudden rise in questions about Progressive’s premium rates, the chatbot will request that information more frequently until the company takes note and can verify that the information they are giving is accurate. Insurance provider Progressive worked with Microsoft Azure to create a chatbot that emulates their mascot Flo, which works like a normal chatbot but with a cheerful and upbeat affect. ABIE was built of Jorsek’s AI platform easyDITA, which allows Allstate to publish information to multiple databases and channels at the same time. That data can then be labeled individually based on the type of categorization required for each channel. As of March 2019, the Ada health guide app has reached 6 million users and has positive testimonials from Vivantes Hospital and the Charité. We begin our list of enterprise chatbot solutions with Ada Health’s app for personal medical guidance.

Banks can deploy chatbots to assist users in applying for loans and to guide them through the application procedure. I compare GPT’s appearance with the launch of the internet in terms of its impact on the future of humanity. It enables machines to understand and generate language interactions in a revolutionary way. GPT (generative pre-trained transformer) AI could disrupt how we engage with technology much like the internet did. The evidence for stochastic parroting is fundamentally incontrovertible, rooted in the very nature of the technology.

But sometimes it’s a very specific question that someone has, and you need just a little more information that an article from the help desk is there to give you. We are also in a regulated industry, so everything that the bot is saying is programmed in – it’s not pulling from other sources. And so we spent a lot of time going back and forth with Quiq to determine what we wanted included. Generative AI can improve procurement by automating operations such as supplier discovery, contract drafting, and purchase order generation, reducing manual labor and errors. It can sift through massive volumes of supplier data, predict demand trends and optimize purchase decisions.

Clover Health uses AI models to assess the risks of each patient’s condition and reduce unnecessary hospitalization. A value-based system may be more beneficial for both the insurance companies and customers than the traditional one. UnitedHealthcare Motion is a wellness opt-in program by an American insurance company that nudges participants into a healthy lifestyle. The chatbot gave out dieting advice to people seeking support for eating disorders, NPR reported in a follow-up piece. NEDA CEO Liz Thompson told NPR the organization was not aware Tessa would be able to create new responses, beyond what was scripted. The founder and CEO of Cass, the company behind Tessa, Michiel Rauws, told NPR Tessa’s upgraded feature with generative AI was part of NEDA’s contract.

Artificial Intelligence and Digital Twins at General Electric

With her warm personality and smiling avatar, Maya makes complicated insurance processes feel approachable. Maya has significantly improved the digital customer experience and efficiency, handling 25% of total inquiries and selling 1.2 million policies in just three years. A customer service chatbot is a conversational commerce tool that provides customer care via text chat, voice commands or both.

But then again, we don’t always get completely accurate information from human agents either – we’ve all been in that type of call center purgatory at one time or another. For this particular scenario, I see this as an issue of regulatory compliance on the one hand, and accuracy on the other. I figure that a service bot’s accuracy, for basic “level one” support inquiries, needs to be on the level of a competent – though perhaps not exceptional – human agent. To be fair, I’m not sure “hallucinations” are the best word for my enterprise AI concerns. In the case of a customer-facing bot for an insurance company, I’d argue that an outright wacky bot answer would be much less damaging than a slightly inaccurate one, which the policy holder might take for true – and run with.

Lemonade created their own chatbot, Maya, to make the customer support process as quick and as pleasant. Swiss insurance company Zurich used a solution by conversational process automation (CPA) startup Spixii, to deliver a similar experience – the Zara chatbot – in just five weeks. Meanwhile, the most prominent players don’t stay behind, making use of advanced chatbots, fraud detection algorithms, or mechanisms improving cost-effectiveness and productivity. According to a report by Deloitte, 98% of insurance executives say that cognitive computing (models simulating the biological brain, such as neural networks) will play a disruptive role in the insurance industry. AI is also shifting the insurance business model with hyper-personalization and value-based healthcare, while IoT is enabling a widespread use of geographic information systems for risk assessment. From financial advice to medical help, providing consumers 24/7 access to services has become a key offering for companies looking to stay ahead of competitors.

Applications of Machine Learning in Pharma and Medicine

A healthcare chatbot can quickly help patients locate the nearest clinic, pharmacy or healthcare center based on their needs. While a chatbot isn’t likely to be your new doctor anytime soon, doctors and health systems increasingly are finding ways to integrate AI into care delivery. In 2022, the American Medical Association (AMA), a professional association and lobbying group for physicians, conducted a survey on digital health care.

We need to stay ahead and people need to be taught new skills in order to try new technology. The continued investment in technology will be something we can do that will differentiate us from the more traditional companies that either cannot or are not willing to change. So, companies that are bogged down by maybe a very dominant agency channel, for example, will be constrained in how fast they can go digital and sell directly. Even though the market preference may be on paper, and they want something online, this cuts out the middle person a lot more.

• But it’s the constraints of Quiq’s bot that make it well-suited for a service bot use case, particularly in a regulated industry.
• From digital platforms that offer seamless policy management to models like peer-to-peer (P2P) insurance and on-demand coverage, we’ll delve into the various facets of insurtech that are setting the stage for a new era in insurance.
• For example, if there were a sudden rise in questions about Progressive’s premium rates, the chatbot will request that information more frequently until the company takes note and can verify that the information they are giving is accurate.
• The bot creates transparency by clearly identifying itself as a bot while setting expectations on when and how one can reach human support.
• One industry that seems nearly synonymous with AI is advertising and marketing, especially when it comes to digital marketing.

This is the technology that underpins image and speech recognition used by companies like Meta Platforms (META 2.41%) to screen out banned images like nudity or Apple’s (AAPL 1.37%) Siri to understand spoken language. Founded in 1993, The Motley Fool is a financial services company dedicated to making the world smarter, happier, and richer. The Motley Fool reaches millions of people every month through our premium investing solutions, free guidance and market analysis on Fool.com, top-rated podcasts, and non-profit The Motley Fool Foundation. This is shaping up as an evolution of customer service (notice I did not say revolution), but success will not be pre-ordained because of generative AI. Each project will have to earn LOOP’s type of success, via careful attention to bot design and data input.

Alex Kreger, UX Strategist & Founder of the financial UX design agency UXDA, increases banking and fintech products’ value in 36 countries. We will continue to monitor how the insurance industry evolves as we anticipate the field will continue to be impacted by AI overtime. We can also organize a real life or digital ChatGPT App event for you and find thought leader speakers as well as industry leaders, who could be your potential partners, to join the event. We also run some awards programmes which give you an opportunity to be recognized for your achievements during the year and you can join this as a participant or a sponsor.

AI could make strides toward achieving the long vaunted goal of precision medicine (personalized care rather than the standardized one-size-fits-all approach more commonly found in health care). It could reduce the administrative burden on clinicians, allowing them to step away from the screen and bring more human interaction back to the bedside. It could lead to more accurate diagnoses for more patients faster than the human workforce alone could ever hope. But with ChatGPT integrations, small companies can create unique products if they have niche but relevant data – in this case, PortfoPlus’s 4,000-odd agent users, whose activity on the app improves the GPT’s self-learning.

In addition, we will conduct a security risk analysis of insurance chatbots using the STRIDE/DREAD combo. The findings of this study are credible and will add value to the existing body of knowledge since minimal exploration of issues of data security of insurance chatbots has been reported so far in the literature. However, a limitation of this study is that our findings are based on a single case study, which limits the scope of generalisation of our results. Nevertheless, this study is a worthy exploration of the data security of insurance chatbots, which has received very little attention thus far in the literature. That explains why artificial intelligence is already gaining broad adoption in the financial services industry through chatbots, machine learning algorithms, and other methods.

• The COVID-19 crisis accelerated digital transformation across various sectors, and insurance was no exception.
• This will help them ‘join the dots’ of the customer’s information and calculate the most suitable support and solutions.
• You should see the chatbot’s responses in the terminal, guiding any off-topic conversations back to insurance-related topics.
• And even AI’s proponents argue computers aren’t ready, and may never be ready, to replace human therapists — especially for handling people in crisis.

AI-driven insights can also help in negotiating better terms and managing supplier relationships by identifying risks and opportunities, resulting in increased procurement efficiency and cost effectiveness. Powered by generative AI, Jasper assists educators in creating comprehensive and customized course materials. By inputting a topic, Jasper can generate detailed lesson plans, lecture notes, and educational content, saving educators significant time and effort. It also serves as a collaborative tool, enabling educators to refine AI-generated content and make sure it aligns with educational standards and goals.

Buffer’s generative AI helps you create compelling posts and manage social media campaigns more efficiently, saving time and increasing audience engagement. Airgap Networks ThreatGPT combines GPT technology, graph databases, and sophisticated network analysis to offer comprehensive threat detection and response. It is particularly effective in complex network environments as it generates detailed analyses and actionable responses to potential threats.

The insurance company is reportedly experimenting with a new app to help drivers involved in a car accident quickly assess the damage to their car in real-time using a smartphone camera. The app’s AI component would be trained on thousands of images from car crashes and as a result could also provide damage-specific repair cost estimates. Athena Robinson, chief clinical officer for Woebot, says such disclosures are critical.

This transformation of making art allows a dynamic participation in the creative process. This allows anybody to combine different artistic styles, create original art, and bring abstract concepts to life through generative AI tools. Tsugi created GameSynth, a procedural sound design tool that uses powerful audio synthesis techniques to generate realistic and varied sound effects. It includes a number of specialized synthesizers and modules for ChatGPT different types of sounds, such as impacts, footsteps, and all-weather effects. GameSynth provides game developers with the ability to build high-quality sound effects that can be easily integrated into their games without the need for extensive sound libraries that allows for more interactive and dynamic audio experiences. SkinVision is a regulated medical service that uses generative AI to analyze skin images for early signs of skin cancer.

Burrus posits that the need for insurance is not being eliminated and insurance companies must be prepared to adapt to these new business opportunities. They are also one of the oldest insurance companies in the world with a very rich history. We are able to bring the best with Ageas worldwide to the Singapore market and experiment where it is necessary. Ageas, also being an insurer, would be very familiar with the governance and the controls that are needed for a successful insurance business. Other challenges would be talent management, future-proofing skills, also artificial intelligence (AI). So, with all the technological advancements and evolving customer expectations, I think training and upskilling of people and employees are necessary.

Building automation on different project management dashboards, simplifying processes in CRM platforms, and managing social media ads and campaigns are a few of the things that generative AI can do for different businesses. Businesses are also taking advantage of generative AI to gather insights from vast datasets to enhance decision-making and innovate product development which increases workforce productivity and profitability. Vendorful is an AI-powered automatic response generator that simplifies the process of responding to RFPs, RFIs, and security questionnaires. Its AI assistant learns from existing content such as previous responses and product documents to provide accurate and contextually appropriate responses quickly. This allows procurement teams to save time, enhance response quality, and raise their chances of winning bids. Yooz uses generative AI to automate invoice and purchase order processing, transforming accounts payable workflows.

Top 10 biggest US banks by assets in 2024: Data drop

Zillow Offers was a program through which the company made cash offers on properties based on a “Zestimate” of home values derived from an ML algorithm. But a Zillow spokesperson told CNN the algorithm had a median error rate of 1.9%, and could be as high as 6.9% for off-market homes. Rivers denied that argument, saying the airline didn’t take “reasonable care to ensure its chatbot was accurate,” So he ordered the airline to pay Moffatt CA$812.02, including CA$650.88 in damages. Moffatt took Air Canada to a tribunal in Canada, claiming the airline was negligent and misrepresented information via its virtual assistant.

Whether it’s claims, new business, or customer queries (call centre, WhatsApp, chatbot, etc.,). In all these interactions we make sure we monitor customer satisfaction and we continually incorporate customer feedback to improve when necessary. The latest figures from Alexsoft, a travel and hospitality technology consulting company, report that almost 61 per cent of customers want to check their claims application status with digital tools.

Financial damages caused by cyber incidents vary based on size and industry of the business, type of incident, data and systems impacted, and more. “The shift to digital channels in Africa is well underway, and with that comes greater expectations of service delivery,” said McKinsey in its report. “While we are seeing a number of insurers starting to digitize customer journeys, significant opportunities still exist to accelerate this in many markets,” its report said.

Their combined expertise in AI, machine learning, and treasury management is revolutionizing fintech, optimizing operations, and advancing financial strategies. Low-code platforms also support scalability and flexibility, allowing insurers to adapt to changing market conditions and customer requirements. By enabling rapid prototyping and testing, insurers can experiment with new ideas and iterate quickly, driving continuous improvement and innovation. Metromile, a key player in the UBI space, has reported a 30% increase in customer acquisition due to its innovative pay-per-mile auto insurance policies, reflecting a growing consumer preference for flexible and tailored insurance solutions. Hui said it relies on humans and our continuously innovative mindset to transcend its applications.

Insurance companies offering such products need to bear in mind that hyper-personalization is more a communication than technological challenge. As Luca Russignan, EY global insurance knowledge leader, points out, when it comes to trends “storytelling is more important than data-driven approaches”. The startup offers self-service, cloud-based insurance data analytics, and automation tools to large and medium-sized companies. According to the company’s statements, Aegon Blue Square Re N.V., XL Insurance, SageSure, Chubb, RenaissanceRe are among its clients. Although STRIDE is the oldest, most mature and established of all threat modelling methods, it cannot be the most suitable for use in all circumstances.

Insurtech offers a more technology-driven, efficient, and customizable approach to insurance, whereas traditional insurance provides established reliability, broader coverage, and personalized human service. The future of the insurance industry may well see a blending of both approaches, leveraging the strengths of each to meet the evolving needs of consumers. Christian Westermann is shaping the application of artificial intelligence (AI) in insurance—from improving decision-making to streamlining processes. As group head of AI at Zurich Insurance he oversees the growth and scalability of AI throughout the company’s insurance value chain globally, guided by a robust Responsible AI framework that is meant to safeguard the company from potential AI risks. This study used the TAM developed by Davis (1989) to elucidate the BI behind utilizing conversational bots to engage with insurers concerning existing policy matters, such as providing information about claims.

According to Gartner, by 2025, AI-powered chatbots will handle 75% of customer interactions in the insurance industry. This shift is driven by the increasing demand for instant, 24/7 customer service and the cost-saving potential of automated solutions. Maya can handle claims in as little as three seconds, providing customers with immediate resolutions and freeing up human agents to handle more complex inquiries.

It’s the brainchild of Just Travel Cover, which partnered with CPP Group UK to create the product. You can foun additiona information about ai customer service and artificial intelligence and NLP. Customers upload a picture of their delayed luggage receipt and Smart Luggage starts a check for the missing checked luggage. Digitalisation can also be a vanguard in the fight against travel insurance fraud and detection software is on the increase. According to Coalition Against Insurance Fraud, US carriers suffered a loss of $80 billion every year, with up to 10 per cent accounting for claims losses.

Models of technology acceptance and use, such as the TRA, TAM, and UTAUT, have been extensively employed to investigate the acceptance of chatbots among both customers and employees within implementing companies (Balan, 2023). Similarly, UTAUT analysis underpins studies by Kuberkar and Singhal (2020), Gansser and Reich (2021), Joshi (2021), insurance chatbot examples Balakrishnan et al. (2022), Pawlik (2022) and de Andrés-Sánchez and Gené-Albesa (2023a). Here’s how businesses get the most out of customer service chatbots on their websites, as well as on Facebook and Twitter. AI-powered chatbots are suitable for more complex interactions, understanding context and providing personalized responses.

These digital assistants can handle inquiries, process claims, and provide policy information in real-time, enhancing customer satisfaction and operational efficiency. Companies like Lemonade have successfully implemented AI-driven chatbots, significantly reducing response times and operational costs. Some start-ups act as B2B (business-to-business), insurance-as-a-service providers offering, for example, APIs that allow enterprises and traditional insurance companies to connect to a variety of risk assessment and rate-quote services.

Before joining Zywave, he honed his skills for a decade at

Accenture, where he led technology initiatives for Global 1000 companies. He also served in executive roles at venture capital-

and private equity-backed SaaS companies, such as SAVO, OpinionLab, Local Offer Network, and RiverGlass. AI bias also presents a danger when it comes to recruitment, potentially discriminating against people who are from certain regions or socio-economic backgrounds. For these reasons, there is still a critical need for human oversight of AI decisions to ensure inclusivity, fairness and equal opportunity.

There are plenty of voices calling for an implementation framework, and many health care organizations have published statements and guidelines. But there are yet to be any cohesive principles or regulations overseeing how AI is being developed and put into use in the US health care system. The idea is not, however, to leave actual product choices to ChatGPT – which first of all is not a licensed broker (although one day…).