3 Broken Insurance Customer Journeys & How digital data intake can fix them

We hate to be the bearer of bad news, but it’s time to face reality: The insurance industry’s customer journeys are broken. To put it plainly, insurance companies are losing customers and revenues due to failures at a very important stage in the customer journey: data intake. 

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The good news is that things that are broken can be fixed. All it takes is the right tools - and an understanding of the nature of the problem. 

3 ways the claims journey is failing

When consumers buy insurance, they hope they’ll never have to actually make a claim. But if the worst does happen and they actually do need to submit a claim, the last thing they need is for issues to come up in the process. Unfortunately, they do all the time. Let’s take a look at a few examples. 

The disconnected customer journey

When Katie* was 22, she had a long daily commute from her college town to the city where her internship was located. One rainy day, a nearby car hydroplaned and collided with Katie’s car. Thankfully, Katie’s injuries were relatively minimal, but her car was completely totaled. 

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As a student with a job to go to and little savings, Katie desperately needed to repair her car as soon as possible. But the process of filing a claim with her auto insurance provider was a complex nightmare. She tried several times to complete the claim online, but errors kept erasing her forms. It took multiple frustrating phone calls and lots of being put on hold to get her claim sorted out. This is hardly a rare scenario. 

The overwhelming customer journey

Greg* is a father of two who takes great pride in fixing up his home with a variety of DIY projects. Unfortunately, he lives in Florida, where storms are a serious risk. Thankfully, he has homeowner’s insurance. When a cyclone came through his area and seriously damaged his home, he had to put in a claim for the first time ever. Although Greg diligently made a claim with his insurance company the day after the storm, he found himself waiting for weeks for the insurance company to process his claim. In the meantime, he and his wife went into debt in order to make their home liveable again. 

The unengaged customer journey

Janice* is in her 70s and lives independently at home with her husband, John*. One day while John was out, Janice unexpectedly slipped and broke her hip. She needed help urgently, and her insurance policy included emergency assistance. Her phone was nearby, so she tried to call the emergency number provided. However, no matter how many times she called, she wasn’t able to reach the insurance company on the phone. 

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Claims journeys happen at a particularly sensitive time in customer lives - when they are hurt, when something they own was broken, when they need to protect their health or property. Insurance companies should try to ease these experiences as much as possible.

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In each of these situations, these customers - the disconnected one, the overwhelmed one, and the unengaged one - have been failed by their insurance providers - all because of issues with the data intake process. 

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And the insurance purchase journey is broken, too

In case you thought, “Hey, at least this problem is limited to the claims journey,” you should know that other journeys are impacted by the same problem. Namely, the buying insurance customer journey suffers greatly from poor digital data intake processes. 

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Imagine you’re Steven*, a 21-year-old who just moved out of his parents' house for the first time and got his own apartment. You’re a responsible kid, so when your parents recommend that you take out a renter’s insurance policy, you make sure to get online and look into some options. You find an insurance company whose website looked decent enough, but when you try and actually get a quote and purchase insurance, you’re asked to print a PDF, fill it out, sign it, scan it, and send it back. Except you don’t even own a printer or a scanner, so you decide to give up on renter’s insurance entirely and hope that you’ll be okay with it. 

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The modern world is full of Stevens - customers who expect a streamlined, easy process in buying things online and who aren’t willing - or even capable of - using old technology to buy insurance. That’s why insurance companies who don’t fix their data intake processes are missing out on potential customers, and all of the revenue that comes with them.

How digital data intake can fix the insurance customer journey

The good news is that the insurance industry’s data intake process doesn’t have to be so difficult. By using no-code, digital data intake solutions, you can transform your complex forms and manual customer data intake processes into an interactive digital data intake journey that saves customers time and keep them happy. Instead of having to send emails, make phone calls, download PDFs, and print paperwork, you can set up the process so your customers will be guided through a series of efficient and user-friendly steps that offer a much better customer experience. 

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Switching to a dynamic and interactive digital data intake journey can offer numerous benefits to your insurance company, including the following:

Speed and efficiency

The modern consumer expects to be able to do things quickly, with nearly 80% of American consumers pointing to speed and convenience as two of the most important elements of a positive customer experience. Traditional methods of data intake take too much time and are often redundant. With digital data intake, a customer can complete the claims or purchasing process on one device with only a few clicks. 

Fewer errors

The more steps that are involved in your data intake processes, the more room there is for errors to be made. But when you automate your customer data collection methods with a digital data intake journey, you reduce the margin for error by simplifying the process, introducing automatic validation, and relying less on fallible humans.

Improved customer experience

Customer experience is central to a business’s success, making a major difference in which company consumers choose to buy from and how much they are willing to spend. 74% of consumers are likely to make purchasing decisions based on experience alone, and 61% of consumers will pay at least 5% more if they know they’ll get a good customer experience. By offering speed, personalization, and ease of use, digital data intake creates a superior customer experience, giving you a major competitive advantage. 

Problem, meet solution 

It’s never easy to find out that something as important as your customer journey is broken and needs fixing. But the pill is a bit easier to swallow when you know that there is a simple solution available to help improve the situation. When it comes to the insurance industry, all it takes is digitizing the data intake process to improve customer experience, increase sales, and boost revenue. 

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*Names changed to protect people’s privacy.