Legacy technology is making it harder for group protection providers to develop products and respond to changing employer and employee demands, according to Lumera.
The insurtech warned that consolidation across the group protection market had left some larger providers operating multiple administration and technology systems across different books of business.
It said this could increase reliance on manual processes, make administration more complex and slow providers’ ability to introduce or change products.
Lumera argued that modernising administration could also help protection providers make better use of the large volumes of policy and member data they already hold.
AI AND DATA OPPORTUNITY
Bringing policy information currently held across fragmented systems into a single platform could make it easier to analyse data and support greater adoption of AI, it said.
Lumera also expects integration between insurers, employee benefit platforms, payroll systems and other workplace providers to become increasingly important as employers seek more connected benefit propositions.
Richard Stewart (main picture), commercial director of Workplace Solutions at Lumera, said: “Group protection providers have a huge amount of data and product knowledge, but outdated administration systems can restrict what they are able to do with it. The problem is often not a lack of ideas or expertise, but whether the technology allows providers to act on them.
“The direction of travel is moving towards integrated propositions that allow employers to connect with insurers, other workplace providers and benefit platforms to deliver greater value to their employees.
“Modern technology will be essential to achieving this as well as harnessing the potential of data analytics and AI to capitalise on the strategic, member-level data held by providers.”
GRADUAL MODERNISATION
Lumera said providers did not necessarily need to migrate entire books of business at once, with policies potentially transferred as corporate schemes renewed and legacy systems retired gradually.
Stewart added: “Modernisation does not have to involve one large and disruptive project. Providers can move books of business gradually and retire older systems over time, giving them a practical route to a more flexible and connected service.”
