There is growing discontent among advisers and consultants about falling provider services standards.
A number of advisers have told Corporate Adviser about increased delays in getting quotation and problems with administration in recent months. There appears to be particularly problems with in the group risk and healthcare sector.
Initially many insurance companies and providers were praised for maintaining reasonable levels of service in the wake of the initial Covid-lockdown. Advisers and consultants said they understood providers were switching to new remote systems and were transitioning their staff to working from home.
But 18 months on there are concerned that pre-pandemic service levels have not returned in some cases.
The Ink Group managing director William Johnson says: “We have definitely seen a difference in service standards over the last 12-18 months with risk and healthcare insurers.
“The pension providers are generally much more automated and cause us fewer problems.”
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One of the key issues he says in the turnaround times for quotations, particularly on renewal business. He says previously renewal quotes used to take around two weeks but are now taking between four and six weeks on average.
Roy McLoughlin, associate director at Cavendish Ware also highlighted the problem of getting existing provider to offer a renewal quote for group risk schemes.
He says: “In some cases it is taking weeks, if not months, to get a renewal quote from the existing provider.
“As brokers it’s our job to get quotes from across the market but it can be impossible to compare if we don’t have the quote from the current provider. Frankly it does not make us look good with the client.”
McLoughlin added that this was an issue in the market around seven or eight years ago, but things had improved. “But since Covid we are seeing this becoming an issue again. Technology is now much improved so I do no understand why it is taking so long to get renewal quotes on existing business.”
Johnson says that turnaround times for all quotations have been getting longer. “We suspect this is because most staff at these providers have been working away from the office and these delays have been due to limited document availability or poor quality of IT systems at home.
“Often calls can’t be transferred and we are then asked to send information using a generic email. This then takes a couple of days to action. Some providers are better than others, but across the board there has been a noticeable drop in standards.”
He adds: “With quotes, some that are online are fairly quick to be returned but with others that are offline there are long delays to receive these back and they also require a lot of chasing.
“With one specific provider, staff are now only working in the office on a Monday. If documents have to be sent into them by post they now state that if they receive anything outside of this day, it will be a week before it’s even looked at.
“Generally, it’s very frustrating and is having a negative impact on the ability of our team to do their jobs for our clients. We hope that in time as more staff get back to the office and normal working hours resume this situation will improve.”
McLoughlin says administration is often “not as smooth as it should be” and there are also underwriting delays. “In some cases this may be an issue with getting medical information from GPs but it is creating further problems for brokers.”
He adds there there are also some issues in the group pension market, particularly when it comes to onboarding new schemes. “We saw this at the start of AE, but it is not clear why these problems are re-emerging now.
“It may be because there is a lack of staff, due to illness and Covid, or it could be because systems are less efficient if staff are working from home. But 18 months on from the start of Covid you would hope that systems would be more streamlined.”
He also said he would like to see more sales support in the field. “There has been a reallocation of resources and there is not the same help and support as there was before.”
However, Howden Employee Benefits & Wellbeing, head of benefits strategy Steve Herbert said generally he had found service standards were better when compared to the start of the pandemic.
“Certainly at the very start of the pandemic — and in particular following the lockdown that was enforced overnight on March 23 — there were significant administration issues for insurers to deal with. But as time has gone on most of the providers have been able to get back up to speed and provide a suitable level of service despite ongoing disruption.”
But he added that the industry faced “particularly difficult challenges” when it came to medical insurance claims. Problems can arise, he says, when it is necessary to refer patients through different treatment pathways and options. “In these scenarios it has sometimes been more difficult for the insurer’s central system to track and control the progress of any given claim.”
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