Can Data Alone Help to Accurately Underwrite Insurance Risk?

With so much data available, insurance carriers would be negligent not to incorporate data into their underwriting processes to make intelligent decisions. However, can data alone help to accurately underwrite insurance risk?

While data tells a story, it can be a more complicated one. The further you dig into the numbers, the more important it becomes to be able to put the numbers into context. Data really only tells half the story and should be considered just the starting point for this reason.

How Data is Helping Insurance Carriers Cut Underwriting Costs
As property and casualty insurance carriers look to cut costs, big data provides an attractive solution to assess risk and minimize underwriting expenses. For example, some insurance carriers are offering incentives and discounts to insureds that are willing to share data from their smart home devices. This is a win-win scenario as the data from these devices helps the insurance carrier to mitigate risk while the insured pays a lower premium.

The insurance industry in general has been slow to take advantage of the advanced analytics from big data. However, insurance carriers that make data a big part of their underwriting processes will have a competitive edge.

The Rise of Data-Driven InsuraTech Companies
Over the past year, several InsuraTech companies have come into the market and are primarily using data to make underwriting decisions and provide insureds with a quick turnaround. For instance, we recently told you about Lemonade, which offers renters and home insurance for urban dwellers via a mobile app. With Lemonade, insureds can receive an insurance decision within seconds simply by supplying some basic information about the property.

The Risk of Relying Solely On Data
There’s no question that data can provide valuable insight and help insurers make informed decisions. However, is relying solely on data to determine which risks are worth taking a smart idea?

As we mentioned above, data doesn’t tell the whole story. If you really want to understand insurance risk, you need underwriting support that takes into consideration more than just data.

For more than 35 years, our team at Insurance Risk Services has been offering a full range of insurance inspection services to our insurance carrier partners to help them make informed decisions. We expand upon data and provide thorough field reports that undergo a rigorous quality assurance review before client delivery. We can even create client-specific reports to target specialized underwriting initiatives.

In short, with the volatility today, you can’t afford to rely on data alone to determine which risks are worth taking. Contact us at Insurance Risk Services to learn how our accurate reports can help you to make the most informed underwriting decisions.