Tokio Marine to Implement Electronic Data Storage

A report from Japan’s Kyodo News Agency notes that Tokio Marine & Nichido Fire Insurance Co. plan to electronically store application documents for automobile and other types of insurance contracts, starting next April, in a bid to save costs and speed up the insurance payout process.

The two companies, which form the Millea Group, will invest around 1 billion yen (app. $92 million) to set up the system, which, when operative, will be able to scan and store digitalized versions of contractual documents produced by the Group’s agents. The system will give employees the ability to retrieve relative claims payment data from computers, rather than manually sorting through archived documents.

The report notes that Japan’s P/C companies are required to renew contracts each year, and to preserve documents for seven years, together with copies of drivers’ automobile inspection certificates that must be attached to automobile insurance papers. Up to now P/C insurers have had trouble and have incurred higher costs in preserving all these documents physically for such a long period. Tokio Marine annually receives around 50 million documents and copies of car inspection certificates, according to company officials.

As a result, Kyodo’s report notes, “it constantly preserves a total of 350 million documents, with related expenses annually amounting to some 1 billion yen. New laws, passed last April, now permit companies to store such dossiers electronically.