The Model of Buying Home Insurance
I envision those insurance companies who still do not provide an online method of selling their insurance policies will cease to exist in the near future. There will be a slow demise of these giants which they themselves will not realize as new customers enter the market and adopt the new methods of buying their needs online from companies who have adapted to this change.
The current model of agent based selling of home insurance policies has become laid back and complacent. There is a good reason why robots are replacing Humans. Because the efficiency and reliability of Humans is far lower than that of the Robots. Robots work 24x7 and provide services without any need for personal interactions and dependency on a Human who may or may not be motivated enough to get the job done.
This process I have personally experienced while trying to purchase auto and home insurance for my assets. I envisioned the tested and proven human touch will come with special custom handling treatment for multiple insurance requirements. However I have been completely disappointed by the lack of eagerness of the human agents assigned to sell insurance who are only half interested in doing what they need to do.
I believe insurance companies are taking on freelancers and pre-employed persons to sell their policies and they come with a lack of training about handling the customer service aspects of their business. These agents may be experts at creating the policies but lack the soft skills needed to be there for the customer when they are needed.
The freelancing agents may have primary jobs as their primary source of income with the insurance business on the side and this may limit them from providing 100% commitment to their side job as part of their responsibilities. I was unable to get timely responses and my emails remained unreplied and I was chasing the agents to get information needed to meet my insurance needs.
I was finally able to purchase my auto insurance for my 4 vehicles from an insurance company that offers a complete online service with no need to interact with any Human agent and it was a very pleasant experience. This is the primary reason for the success of new companies like Geico and Progressive who have managed to penetrate the insurance market that has been run by giants for decades.
In this era of growth and rapid market acquisition, I believe those who use technology to provide excellent automated self service methods to do business. which compensates for the shortfall of expectations from human services, are going to define who will stay in business and who will fold in the next decade.
For my needs, I finally decided to stay with the current insurance company instead of enduring the disappointment of finding new insurance for my assets after trying hard with 3 different agents from different insurance companies who could not deliver their product. I am wondering if it is so hard to buy their product, then how hard will it be if they have to process and pay out my claim ???
Best Regards,
Samuel Benjamin
sammybenjamin@gmail.com
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