For those of us who have been in this industry awhile, the Property and Casualty (P&C) insurance market continues to be plagued by inefficiencies in claims handling and litigation management. Adjusters assigned to manage the claim are geographically dispersed, have varying degrees of expertise about the loss event, and handle multiple claims simultaneously. Disparate legacy systems still exist, and silos are prevalent between business, technology, and lines of business. This can result in wasted time and compromised claim performance.

Industry leading insurers should consider applying unified communications and collaboration technologies to lower claim expenses, while transforming the entire claims process into a seamless experience for all parties involved. Insurers continue to be challenged with diverse collaboration methods, especially for long-tail, complex claims in litigation, frequently with high monetary exposure potential and multiple collateral sources involved. A well-defined collaboration strategy can benefit customers, self-insureds, defense law firms handling insurer claims in litigation, agents, brokers, third-party administrators, government entities, court systems and reinsurers.

Adopting a Collaboration Strategy for Claims and Litigation Management

In the highly competitive P&C market, enterprise business leaders demand results -fast.

Consumers are going online and mobile, with mobility being a top priority. More people, whether clients or claims management professionals, use smartphones, tablets, video capture devices, e-readers and other web-enabled mobile communication devices to access or create content wherever, however, and whenever they want. In this age of mobility, insurers must learn to operate without compromising the value they add to society by managing and mitigating risk.

Without an effective claims management solution, an insurance carrier runs the risk of decreased customer satisfaction and loss of business. Carriers look to technology to find reliable, customized solutions which provide end-to-end capabilities to control the entire claims and litigation lifecycle and collaboration technology should be as an important technology within this context. Communication and collaboration technology offers P&C insurers a path to creating a better experience for clients and the professionals serving them. For optimal claims performance and business results, P&C insurers should consider the following collaboration elements in their claims operations:

• A variety of digital content, including digitized voice, pictures, and video.
• Mobility helps insurers extend support services to their customers, keeping them engaged and satisfied. Insurers are now arming their sales teams with mobile-based technology solutions that provide real-time access to carrier systems. These enable agents a convenient way to showcase their offerings to prospects, and to readily adapt to unique client needs.
• The needs of multiple participants -claimant, insurance company employees and external service providers who create and/or consume claims management content and could be located anywhere or want to access content at any time.
• Access to remote subject matter experts at critical points in the claims FNOL, settlement and subrogation as it is critical to actively assess risk exposures throughout the claims process.
• Organizing and optimizing the increasing number of media forms used to create content, communicate, and collaborate during the claim management process between participants.
• Providing secure access to the increasing number of wireless devices with the functionality to access and share the media and/or content used throughout the claims management process.
• A flexible collaboration platform that enables communications, collaboration and management of content regardless of device type or nature or amount of content.

P&C insurers need to realize the value at stake by not incorporating new technology capable of supporting the range of media, content, and devices used throughout the claims management process. By not incorporating available technology to help strengthen the business, industry participants face missed opportunities including:

• Inefficient asset utilization and increased costs.
• Decreased employee productivity.
• Wasted resources in supply chain and logistics.
• Competitive disadvantage and loss of customers to more tech savvy industry rivals.
• Increased distribution and time to market due to lack of innovation.

Top-tier Insurance companies must examine how technology can impact every aspect of their business processes - including both cost-cutting and revenue-generation activities. An omnichannel solutions approach will help insurers utilize more valuable and relevant methods of customer and workplace interactions. As a result, insurance companies will save time, money and resources -differentiating themselves from competitors.

Top-tier insurers have already started incorporating electronic forms and signature capabilities accompanied by virtual face-to-face meetings with customers, agents and interested parties through high-definition video. A sound collaboration strategy empowers insurance business leaders to generate stronger customer relationships, faster decision-making and innovation, and improved productivity, while enjoying lower costs, more agility and greater competitiveness in the P&C market.

For more information, visit our solutions page , as we are here to help, Cisco is a market leader and innovator in collaboration applications. We welcome your thoughts in the comments section below.