Page 20 - Insurance Times October 2020

chase. In the past few months, the surance policy and the charge to the online with new-age digital travel
feature was piloted in the online jour- customer's credit card happens only at aggregators. It becomes more rel-
ney, where it was opted by 1 in 2 cus- the time of the insurer accepting the evant for pure protection policies
tomers successfully. With the introduc- risk. where it is financial and medical under-
tion of this feature, Max Life has ex- Reviewing data for online term sales of writing involved leading to higher turn-
perienced an uplift in conversion, the Max Life, it has been observed that around time in the policy issuance pro-
contribution of sales from the affluent nearly 8% of all applied policies/cases cess.
segment and better customer experi- end up in decline or postponement. We have seen a phenomenal ~80%
ence, with a reduction in grievance and Under such circumstances, the amount growth (YTD August) in protection
refund related issues. collected from the customer during sales on our e-commerce channel, that
In its continuous endeavour to the purchase process is to be re- has been possible due to our commit-
strengthen customer trust, the feature funded. Usually, this refund process ment towards building a truly en-
that is available for policies bought takes around 8-10 working days and hanced customer experience and fur-
online, allows customers to apply for a this delay often results in customer ther simplifying policy-buying in the
policy with the proposal form and a anxiety, leading to poor customer and new era."
payment instruction through a digital distributor experience. He added, "At Max Life, we are com-
payment method (Currently available Commenting on the feature, V mitted to creating robust and highly
on credit card payments.) without the Viswanand, Deputy Managing Direc- memorable customer journeys in the
actual deduction of money until the tor, Max Life said, "Building trust at digital value chain and our latest 'Buy
proposal is evaluated by the insurer. the moment of truth is critical in a life Now - Pay at Approval' feature is an
The actual premium deduction hap- insurance purchase process. This fea- effort in the same direction. Differen-
pens just before the policy issuance. ture allows new age, millennial, digi- tiating our customer onboarding jour-
The feature ensures that the customer tally savvy, affluent customers, to ex- neys, the feature allows digitally-savvy
does not need to make any payment perience life insurance purchase just consumers to avail term insurance at
at the time of applying for the life in- like they experience booking hotels their own convenience."

IRDAI chief wants expansion of health cover to include OPD care

IRDAI Chairman Subhash Chandra Khuntia has urged the insurers to expand the ambit of health insurance to include
outpatient care as part of the health insurance system to pushmillennial to buying insurance. It is time for insurers to
move on to primary and secondary care, and preventive care as they have been focused on tertiary care and
hospitalisation for long.

Speaking at a health insurance summit, Khuntia urged insurers to develop disease-specific products which could help
policyholders in preventing different ailments.
He further said insurer need to catch people young for health insurance. "Youngsters have this notion that they are
generally healthier than the older generation. We have a situation wherein a large proportion of health insurance is
bought by the 40-50 age group," said Khuntia.

In the light of the Covid-19 pandemic, health insurance has seen a surge in demand from consumers. At a time when
the non-life insurance industry has been struggling due to the pandemic-induced lockdown, health insurance has seen
13.4 per cent growth in the first half of 2020-21, compared to the same period last financial year. The standard Covid
products brought in by the regulator have also been received well by policyholders. So far, 15 million lives have been
covered against Covid-19. The Covid-specific products were launched on July 10.
Speaking about the missing middle class from the health insurance sector, Khuntia said people at the upper end of the
economic scale are aware of health insurance needs. For the poorer sections of society, the government has some
health insurance schemes, such as Ayushman Bharat, but the middle class - estimated at 700 million people - does not
avail of health insurance in a big way.

The Insurance Times, October 2020