P/C Insurers Way Behind in Digital Customer Service: J.D. Power

Property/casualty insurers have a long way to go toward meeting customer expectations about their digital interactions.

A new J.D. Power 2018 Insurance Digital Experience Study concludes that while a few insurers have excelled with digital customer service, such as GEICO and Allstate, many other insurers struggle to match digital customer service standards set by digital pioneers such as Amazon, Netflix and Uber.

“While many insurers are falling short, the leaders are establishing best practices for how to build engagement, create personalized digital experiences and deliver consistency across digital components,” Tom Super, director of the Property & Casualty Insurance Practice at J.D. Power, said in prepared remarks.

J.D. Power singled out Allstate as doing well with the digital shopping experience, scoring 808 out of 1,000 for shopping satisfaction, well above the 779 industry average. The insurer scored well in areas such as ease of navigation, availability of key information and clarity of information.

GEICO similarly sets the bar for digital service, J.D. Power said in the study. The insurer scored 878 for service satisfaction, above the industry average of 850. According to J.D. Power, the insurer performed well in all areas rated: ease of navigation; appearance; availability of key information; range of services; and clarity of information.

Among the report’s major findings:

• Insurers have done well in creating attractive user interfaces, but they struggle with core insurance functionality. J.D. Power said that “most insurers’ digital offerings are lacking in insurance-specific capabilities such as processing claims, effective shopping and servicing of policies.”

• Insurers that excelled in personalizing their offerings and customer needs had higher digital customer satisfaction scores. The same went for carriers that offered such digital tools such as chatbots and app features.

J.D. Power expanded this year’s study to include an assessment of a carrier’s overall digital performance based on an industry agnostic view of digital best practices combined with customer perceptions of their interactions with the 19 largest P/C insurance brands in the United States. The study was conducted in partnership with Centric Digital to provide an industry benchmarking and digital experience analysis supported by J.D. Power’s analysis.

The 2018 Insurance Digital Experience Study is based on evaluations from 11,304 respondents and took place February-March 2018.

Source: J.D. Power

Topics Carriers Property Casualty