COVID-19 impact on group insurance companies has been saved
Perspectives
COVID-19 impact on group insurance companies
Combating the current crisis. Preparing for the future.
Prior to the COVID-19 pandemic, group insurance companies were facing many challenges—from high competition to insurance digital disruption. Now amplified by the crisis, how can group insurers overcome these issues? Explore how our respond, recover, and thrive framework can help group insurers respond to the crisis, navigate potential continued disruption, and reposition themselves for future growth.
What’s shaping the group insurance services market?
In recent years, group insurance companies have been combating low interest rates, the impact of rising medical costs, and slowing client demands. Due to these challenges, group insurers have been less digitally focused than their counterparts in the health insurance and retirement segments. COVID-19 has further highlighted this gap, as US unemployment is expected to remain in the high over the next year, stressing the traditional growth engine for most carriers.
Coupled with the potential for sustained economic disruption and difficulties in accessing medical professionals for medical underwriting due to near-term focus on COVID-19-related care, the industry will want to respond in ways that will set a foundation for future success in a post-COVID-19 world.
Impact and implications of COVID-19 on the group insurance industry
Insights to help group insurance companies respond, recover, and thrive
To help insurers respond to this crisis, we have outlined areas that group insurance companies may want to focus on while navigating different stages of the pandemic.
A framework to enable resilient leadership
As the coronavirus remains active in open and partially open state and local economies, group insurance companies can expect to face a continuing cycle of upswings and downswings in claim volume and premium remittances. This cycle can hamper a smooth transition from what we call the Respond phase to the Recover and Thrive phases. Nonetheless, group insurance companies must continue to forge ahead and remain resilient, continually updating their strategies and operating plans with lessons learned in each cycle.
Striving for long-term success
To thrive in the long term, well beyond the end of the pandemic, group insurance companies should aim to focus on the following:
- Digitizing the customer experience, providing self-service capabilities and tools that are designed to enable employers, employees, and brokers to engage in an entirely virtual environment
- Achieving mass customization through configurable products that enable speed and flexibility and support higher levels of automation across the value chain
- Transforming middle- and back-office processes to increase productivity and keep costs manageable, leveraging a complement of integrated, intelligent technologies that deliver seamless operations
- Enabling data-driven business outcomes, improving customer intimacy, and improving decision-making across the end-to-end value chain
Get in touch
Bill Mullaney
Managing Director | Consulting Insurance Practice
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