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How Automotive Telematics Reduces Car Insurance Fraud

How Automotive Telematics Reduces Insurance Fraud?

We all know that are car insurance is going up because of whiplash cases, bad driving by a certain age group and EU law but how can we push back and make it more difficult for motorists to do a fraudulent claim and secondly reduce insurance for good driving whether you are male or female?

One of the buzz words in the 21st century has to be connectivity. The need to be connected on-the-go has been the catalyst for communication technology to evolve in ways that no one had imagined before! Technology has made it possible for people to work from any part of the world and communicate with others from the comfort of their car.

Now your car’s dashboard console can be transformed into a hi-tech communication terminal with the possibility of hosting various applications, with the help of Automotive Telematics.

What is Automotive Telematics?

Automotive Telematics refers to the technology that uses hardware and software applications with remote communication devices, like cell phones, GPS, wireless devices and such, to obtain information about vehicles. In developed countries, automotive telematics has been in use, mostly in high-end vehicles, for quite some time. But today newer technologies are helping unfold many opportunities for all stakeholders, more importantly in emerging economies.

Telematics enables vehicle owners or customers to constantly be in touch with service providers through incorporated software and hardware in their vehicles. In turn, service providers too, can offer a host of new services based on their customers’ preferences. Also, data sent remotely from a vehicle allows stakeholders like auto makers, dealers, fleet managers, and insurance providers to build better customer-relationship strategies.

How is it Beneficial?

With telematics, it is possible for all stakeholders to get key information directly from the vehicle, which when integrated with core CRM applications, allows them to get better insight into their customer. Key data on vehicle operations, driving behavior, collision warnings, vehicle position & navigation, mileage, etc. enable stakeholders to provide predictive and remote diagnostic services, emergency services, right product mix, and various other value added services to customers.

Car makers, for example, are harnessing telematics to align their eCommerce strategies. At the same time, they are able to launch targeted campaigns, reduce marketing expenses, and explore cross-sell/up-sell opportunities. Ultimately, this aligns well with their objective of improving customer relationships and consequently increasing brand loyalty.

Dealers benefit because they can provide predictive services using the telematics data. “You may get a call even before you notice a problem with your car, thanks to remote monitoring of performance or maintenance data provided by your vehicle’s telematics console.” Several diagnostic and repair services can be offered to customers long after the sale of vehicle. Emergency teams can reach customers quicker if the vehicle automatically sends a crash notification to the service provider or dealer.

Insurance providers benefit as they are able to respond faster to customer claims by using the accident data provided by telematics-equipped vehicles. This results in increased customer satisfaction and retention. It also provides additional opportunities to reduce investigation costs and avoid fraud.

More importantly, based on the data provided by telematics-equipped vehicles, insurers are in a better position to assess risk and allow insurers to offer ‘usage-based’ or ‘pay-as-you-drive’ insurance models, rewarding customers in terms of lower premiums for better and safe driving.

The Final Word

Companies are investing considerably to integrate telematics services with the core CRM capabilities to improve customer experience. In today’s business world, it is absolutely important to ‘sense the change’ and ‘adapt to deliver’.

As someone rightly said, “If we don’t take care of our customers someone else will.” 

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Comments: (4)

Ketharaman Swaminathan
Ketharaman Swaminathan - GTM360 Marketing Solutions - Pune 13 December, 2012, 11:02Be the first to give this comment the thumbs up 0 likes

Nice article. Data of the nature described here is surely beneficial to auto manufacturers, dealers and insurers. From discussions with a couple of auto manufacturers, I gather that, according to privacy laws in EU and elsewhere, such data must be streamed directly from the car to the auto manufacturer, without access being provided even to the car owner, let alone third-parties. Maybe I got it wrong but it'd help if you could please throw some more light on who exactly a TSP is and its roles and responsibilities (assuming that it's different from the MNO whose network is used for the data streaming).

A Finextra member
A Finextra member 14 December, 2012, 14:42Be the first to give this comment the thumbs up 0 likes

Thanks for the comment Ketharaman. As you maybe aware that KPIT provide the dashboard technology and vehicle diagnostic software for many car manufacturers and as a Telematics Service Provider it would be a logical extension to that relationship with the Car Manufacturer who will own that IP data and they will decide what to do with that information. A number of European Car Manufacturers have relationships with plug-in Telematic solution providers already and they have brokered deals via their car financing divisions to work with 3rd party insurance companies so the practice is already occuring. KPIT's approach mentioned above is a much more integrated and sophisticated approach but as with the Apple Iphone debate about tracking people and where they go through their phones GPS system, there needs to a discussion on what data can be used and what is not exceptable. It does however open up a whole new revenue stream for car manufacturers which I sure will appeal to them in these current economic times in EMEA.   

Ketharaman Swaminathan
Ketharaman Swaminathan - GTM360 Marketing Solutions - Pune 14 December, 2012, 15:17Be the first to give this comment the thumbs up 0 likes

@RupertF: TY for your reply. No, I'm not aware of KPIT's dashboard technology. If I understand you correctly, the TSP is "embedded" into the auto manufacturer and acts on its "badge".

Matt White
Matt White - Finextra - Toronto 14 December, 2012, 16:04Be the first to give this comment the thumbs up 0 likes

Let's not stray too far into product chat please gents. You can use the messaging system for that. 

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