QuickBytes: How this firm is embedding insurance into the customer journey

For the average person, insurance can seem complicated and daunting. Whether it’s navigating policy documents with pages of legal language, figuring out the best policy for your needs, or jumping through hoops to submit claims that take forever to process, it’s usually no fun for anyone.

That’s why insurtech has come up as an exciting opportunity. The segment makes the most of technology to improve the customer experience.

One company that’s actively looking to transform insurance is Cover Genius. Founded in Sydney, Australia, in 2014 by co-founders Chris Bayley and Angus McDonald, it focuses on enabling embedded protection for digital companies around the globe.

Embedded protection allows consumers to receive tailored protection alongside the core product they are purchasing from their favorite brands. Think of it like adding on travel insurance when you’re buying flight tickets or getting an extended warranty on a new smartphone.

Barney Pierce, chief business officer of Europe, Middle East, and Africa and Asia Pacific at Cover Genius / Photo credit: Cover Genius

Offering customers this flexibility and customization is essential in today’s world, where consumers expect personalized offerings that meet their needs. Barney Pierce, chief business officer of Europe, Middle East, and Africa and Asia Pacific at Cover Genius, shares more about how the firm is going about achieving this.

The following interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.

What problem is your company trying to solve?

Our co-founders, Chris and Angus, pivoted their global online travel agency (OTA) after experiencing two key problems firsthand. At the time, there was no solution for distributing protection products to a global audience, meaning a partner – a travel agency, for example – would need to negotiate separate deals with insurers in different markets, which is difficult.

It was also the partner’s responsibility to build a platform that could handle different market requirements and other aspects of insurance such as claims processing, pricing, and payouts.

Cover Genius co-founders Chris Bayley and Angus McDonald / Photo credit: Cover Genius

To address this, they launched Cover Genius, which has focused extensively on acquiring the necessary licenses or authorizations in more than 60 countries and all 50 US states to distribute insurance (and non-insurance) products at a global level via our award-winning XCover platform.

We also observed that firms don’t present relevant coverage to consumers at their checkout points, hindering take-up rates. There was a great opportunity to engage customers by offering a personalized solution to each customer instead of a one-size-fits-all approach.

How do you differentiate yourself from other insurtech players in the market?

Our API dynamically generates tailored policies based on customers’ purchase details. Additionally, our embedded technology offers personalized protection in any country, language, and currency, which sets us apart from other insurtechs in this region.

What opportunities are there for embedded protection in the region?

There is tremendous opportunity. In our Embedded Insurance Retail Report, we found that more than 60% of consumers would buy insurance or warranties from their ecommerce retailers if it were offered at checkout, and 78% of customers said they would spend more if offered protection during checkout, as it provides them with a sense of security in case something goes wrong with their purchases.

For this region, travel is an early use case for embedded protection. Travel and protection are a natural fit, and online travel platforms have exploded in recent years. We see an opportunity for travel businesses to increase their customer satisfaction with “Cancel For Any Reason” (CFAR) protection. The global travel sector has seen higher demand and satisfaction with CFAR protection when customers book flexible airfare and accommodation.

We also see a lot of value in embedding protection for ecommerce retailers. We’ve worked with ecommerce platform Coupang, helping increase sales by 20% by adding CFAR protection.

Insurance doesn’t have a great reputation when it comes to the customer experience. How are you addressing this?

We’re addressing this through the use of our in-house technology capabilities, which can adapt to customer needs across different distribution channels and device types. Brands can streamline the flow of claim information, resulting in improved customer journeys, faster claim settlement, and reduced claim handling expenses through automation.

Photo credit: Cover Genius

Claim handling has traditionally remained a very manual part of the insurance product life cycle. However, with the technologies available today that can guide process changes, service reengineering, and forecasting methodologies, we’ve been able to reduce support inquiries 7x and bring claims resolutions down to six days.

We’re also glad to have received a Net Promoter Score of +65*, which means that the majority of customers are pleased with our services.

*The score includes any type of claim and claim outcome across our partner network, except for those partners with less than 30 claims and those not assessed by Cover Genius. Inquiry statistics are derived from an internal analysis of 1,355 random XCover support inquiries from December 2022. Out of that number, 97 (7%) had activated their account while 1,258 (93%) had not activated.

What challenges are you working to address?

Some challenges include how to cater to a global audience and how to integrate with different technology models to deliver an end-to-end customer-centric solution. Customers nowadays don’t want to take an inconvenient “second step” to seek out insurance options, and they’d prefer tailored protection offered directly at the point of sale or sign up.

Additionally, as personalization becomes increasingly important, customers expect a high level of engagement from the platforms and services they interact with in their daily lives. One area where legacy insurance has failed is coming up with hyper-relevant protection that is customized to the buyer’s needs and preferences.

Who are some of the partners you’ve worked with?

We’ve had the opportunity to work with many of the world’s largest digital companies including Booking Holdings – owner of Booking.com and Agoda – Turkish Airlines, Zip, and MakeMyTrip. We’re also available on leading ecommerce platforms Amazon, eBay, and Shopee.

For our partnership with Zip, a leading buy now, pay later platform in Australia, we offer its customers “Protection Pocket,” where we embed protection into Zip’s checkout for a seamless customer experience. By using natural language processing capabilities to identify relevant items in a customer’s cart, we are able to match them to our product categories and return an optimized policy to the customer via a single API.

As for MakeMyTrip, India’s leading online travel company, we worked with them to offer millions of customers tailored travel protection embedded in the booking path with a CFAR option for ultimate flexibility. This comes on the heels of our embedded insurance travel report where we found that 69% of Indian travelers prefer embedded travel protection from OTAs, travel providers, and airlines for their next trip.

Cover Genius is the insurtech firm for embedded protection. It protects the global customers of the world’s largest digital companies including Intuit, Skyscanner, Ola, Ryanair, Turkish Airlines, Descartes ShipRush, Zip, redBus, SeatGeek, and Booking Holdings (owner of Booking.com and Agoda). It is also available at Amazon, Flipkart, eBay, Wayfair, and Shopee.

Cover Genius’ vision is to protect all customers of the world’s largest online companies through XCover, an award-winning global distribution platform for any line of insurance or warranty, with an API for instant claims payments.

Learn more about how you can build embedded protection into your business by visiting Cover Genius’ website.

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This content was produced by Tech in Asia Studios, which connects brands with Asia’s tech community. Learn more about partnering with Tech in Asia Studios.