* Life COO, Chula Hettiarachchi elaborates on digital strategy for life insurance 

Boosted by a high standard of customer service and retention, operational efficiency and technological innovation, Asian Alliance Life Insurance has been experiencing strong growth, far above the industry norm.

Rising up to the challenge of ensuring that high customer service standards are maintained and costs are managed prudently in this high-growth scenario, Asian Alliance Insurance has opted for further technological innovation that streamlines processes, enhances customer convenience and benefits all key stakeholders with the inclusion of its latest innovation – ‘Click4Life’.

In this interview, Asian Alliance Insurance – Life Chief Operating Officer (COO), Chula Hettiarachchi, elaborates on how technological innovation – at the point of interacting with the customer, as well as in back-office processes – have equipped the company to offer a superior service to its customers while simultaneously increasing operational efficiency.

Q: How has Asian Alliance Insurance performed financially in life insurance and how does this performance compare with that of the industry?

A: The growth momentum of Asian Alliance in life insurance in the recent past has consistently exceeded that of the local life insurance industry. For instance, considering specifically the first half (1H) of the 2015 financial year, Asian Alliance performed exceptionally well. Our Life Gross Written Premium (GWP) grew 31% year-on-year (YoY), while Life GWP growth of the industry was only 14% YoY in the same period – indicating that we are growing at double the industry average. We recorded significant improvements in both the top-line and the bottom-line.

In addition to its obligations to clients and employees, Asian Alliance, as a publicly quoted company, has consistently met its obligations to its investors in providing a good return. In managing our fast-growing client portfolios, cost management has become a vital element – and we have addressed this through technological innovation. The IT-based approach in all key areas of operations has ensured that costs have grown at a significantly lower rate in comparison with the growth in revenue. The expense ratio, which is an important indicator in this regard has been consistently on a downward trend and is below the industry average.

Q: How has technological innovation directly benefited Asian Alliance’s life policyholders?

A: We operate in the top market segment, catering to an elite customer base and our average customer value currently is Rs. 90,000 – which is four times that of the industry. Thus the customers have high expectations and expect a very high service standard. We have met this need largely by offering greater customer convenience and value addition through technological innovation.

For the first time in the local insurance industry, our ‘Click4Life’ application gave life policyholders direct access to conveniently fulfil many of their requirements through a PC/mobile app without manual intervention.

The services available via the app include convenient payment of premiums at any time, intimation of hospitalization claims, accessing personal information and changing policy details when required. This can also be used by policyholders to obtain a range of information on their policies – including the type of the policy, terms, payment mode, commencement date and benefits – and to request for various documents such as tax letters, surrender value certificates, embassy letters, premium summaries, payment history and bonus summaries.

A large number of our customers are already using this app and in the near future we will use it as a service rating mechanism as well, thus enabling us to monitor and further enhance customer satisfaction.

Similarly, our ‘Click2Pay’ application, which has been provided to our Insurance Advisors for premium collections, enables customers to receive acknowledgement of their premium payments within a very short time period and thus increases transparency as well. From an operational viewpoint, this also enhances speed and accuracy while reducing the possibility of misappropriation etc. and is thus beneficial to the company.

Further, we were the country’s first to introduce self-service insurance kiosks, through which life policyholders can conveniently fulfil many needs.

Q: What are the company’s other innovations in back-office processes relating to life insurance and how have they enhanced operational efficiency?

A: We have already introduced Optimal Character Recognition (OCR), which enables computers to directly capture hand-written data in various customer documents, thus eliminating the need for manual data entry and making the process of issuing a policy considerably faster and more accurate.

This has enabled us to issue 50% of our life policies within a day.

Developing even further on this idea, we will shortly enable customers to fill out forms on tablet devices, enabling data to be directly captured and stored, thus further enhancing the speed and accuracy of the process.

We also have in place a computerized workflow system with live dashboard monitoring system that can monitor the status of each and every new application/proposal, revival, alteration or claim and enable staff to be monitored for higher performance and efficiency.

Q: In addition to technological innovation, what other measures are being taken to add value to life policyholders of Asian Alliance?

A: We have launched a massive Customer Relationship Management (CRM) programme to reward our policyholders. For the first time in the country’s life insurance industry each-and-every policyholder will be rewarded under this initiative.

At present, in the local life insurance industry, the customer only has a relationship with his/her Insurance Advisor and if this person leaves the company etc. the policy will often lapse. Within the first three years, 80% of life policies in Sri Lanka lapse, which is a serious issue as these customers will not get their money back and they also do not have insurance cover. While Asian Alliance has a far superior record – with a retention rate of 80% in the first year in life insurance – our new CRM programme would further strengthen our relationship with our customers by putting seven departments in charge of interacting with different tiers of customers.

Asian Alliance Insurance PLC is held by Softlogic Capital PLC and is part of the Softlogic Group, which is recognized as one of Sri Lanka’s most diversified and fastest-growing conglomerates with interests in Healthcare, Retail, ICT, Leisure, Automobiles and Financial Services. Significant stakeholders in the company also include FMO and DEG that are rated ‘AAA’ Development Financial Institutions from the Netherlands and Germany respectively.