Specialization, innovation key to driving customer satisfaction in insurance
Stakeholders in the Nigerian insurance industry believe that in order to operate in the new regime, operators must embrace specialization in core areas of competence and continually come up with innovative ideas to improve customer satisfaction.
Besides that, they believe that improving insurance awareness is a collective responsibility of all stakeholders in the insurance industry.
In a communiqué issued at the end of the 2018 Insurance Professional Forum held in Abeokuta, Ogun State, with the theme “The Insurance Industry: Beyond Limits” participants resolved that operators must put machinery in motion that will ensure regular updates of operational data to aid making current informed decisions as-at-when-due.
The Forum also advised all insurance operators to self-regulate, and apply necessary discipline on erring members when required, instead of waiting for the regulator to always wade in before achieving major milestones.
While aligning with the regulator position of sanctioning any company that engages in de-marketing under the ongoing Tier-Based Minimum Solvency Capital Policy, the forum agreed that de-marketing acts by operators in any form should be dealt with as applicable.
They also agreed on the need to ensure regular training and re-training of personnel to meet up with current realities and also encourage the inflow of manpower from other disciplines into the insurance industry for versatility.
Other resolutions reached at the meeting includes that “pro-active measures should be taken by the Industry to ensure that no further business line is statutorily, disruptively or otherwise lost to any other sector of the economy; implored operators to update their information technology base to global standards to operate; embrace effective professional development of their staff to enhance competence, deliver improved services to consumers and meet the expectation of investor; embrace ethical culture to have a disciplined, trusted and respected insurance industry.
The forum also agreed that whistle blowers should come out boldly on cases, and the identity of whistle blowers must always be protected at all times when issues are escalated to the Chartered Insurance Institute of Nigeria.
The forum agreed that the Institute will continually come up with addendum and circulate same to all practitioners as the contents of the changes and amendments evolve as time unfolds, and it is her responsibility to regularly follow up with all those assigned with responsibility of implementing a communiqué to ensure the resolutions are worked upon and achieved.
Eddie Efehoha, president, Chartered Insurance Institute of Nigeria in his opening address at the forum said this year’s theme is an expression of what we all want the insurance industry develop into.
He said that we all know that the balance of power is heavily tilting towards the consumers and new and ongoing social trends are shaking traditional business patterns in the insurance industry.
“Definitely, the relentless march of online and mobile technology will continue to fuel the constant change in customer expectations. Online social networks are becoming pooling mechanisms for insurance and whether we like to admit it or not, insurance companies are fast changing roles from being product manufacturers to administrative service providers. The evolution is here and we must embrace it.”
Efekoha further stated that advances in software and hardware are transforming “big data” into information that gives enough insight into the future for decision makers to take action.
“As the insurance Industry reaps gains from the most recent wave of automation, new technologies are significantly enhancing operational efficiencies, increasing revenue opportunities and improving customer experience.”
He said “we need to ensure persistence, respect, integrity and passion by way of ethics in the industry to boost the confidence of customers.