Tele-underwriting

Tele-underwriting is not a new concept. It was introduced in the US some 10 years ago using call centres to gather medical data from applicants. It was heralded as the new way that would reduce turn around times, cut down on the need for GPRs, improve the quality of data and proportion of cases proceeding.

Tele-underwriting has not yet proved to be the underwriting panacea that many forecast but is now gathering momentum quickly in the US. There has been a move to using trained tele-underwriters rather than call centre operatives to overcome the need for scripts that attempted to cover every possible scenario.

In the UK, specialist firms, such as Morgan Ash, are using qualified nurses to fulfill this role. Distributors and providers are adopting various methodologies.

On the provider side, there are disparate views. On the one hand, there are providers who see tele-writing as the Holy Grail. Others suggest that there are not enough competent staff to do the job.

Distributors are similarly polarised, although a majority believe that a change in the process whereby the provider rather than the adviser becomes responsible for acquiring medical data, other than high-level information, is inevitable.

This is an issue that we will look at in the 2006 Protection Report. As more advisers have actual experience of tele-underwriting, the more informed respondents will be to our interviews and thus the better the findings.

If you have views on this subject, please e-mail.

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