Instead of going through the onerous task of completing different questionnaires, via different routes, to obtain different quotes from different providers, advisers can often access the market via one questionnaire to obtain ‘buy now’ fully underwritten prices across various insurers.
That said, it is worth noting that this can still be dependent, albeit to a much lesser degree, on specific insurer processes. For example, sending a link to the client to complete medical questions might not always be enough to provide an accurate quote. Also, where the risk is non-standard, more information will inevitably be required.
For this reason, some advisers such as Cura Financial Services – which offers specialty protection advice for those with high-risk occupations or pre-existing medical conditions – prefer not to use a third-party to do tele-interviews.
Alan Knowles, Managing Director at Cura, says: “We prefer to retain control and believe the customer experience is better by only having to deal with one firm. There are other brokers that do the polar opposite. I guess it’s about having options for both models.”
Here, we take a look at some of the portal options available (in alphabetical order).
Iress
The Exchange from Iress is an online quote and apply portal for advisers. Mr Miller comments: “The Exchange provides unlimited 24/7 access and is supported by all the leading providers and 30,000+ users. It includes a comprehensive range of protection, annuities and equity release products.
“We aim for speed and accuracy, with no re-keying and applications are pre-populated at the touch of a button, providing advisers with real-time premium information. It automatically compares single benefit against multi-benefit products on a single screen, with the option to compare up to five protection benefits at the same time. The Exchange also integrates with many industry-leading CRMs via application programming interface (API).”
iPipeline
iPipeline’s SolutionBuilder automatically passes information (adviser CRM, client portal and third party) into extranets to pre-populate them and reduce underwriting. Once in an extranet, the company’s self-service end-to-end SSG Digital Platform enables providers to offer a range of processes: direct to consumer, buy now, fully underwritten, and even enables advisers to delegate completion of underwriting parts of the application to the customer.
Paul Yates, product strategy director at iPipeline, says: “With SolutionBuilder, we pass in ‘quote’ data which greatly reduces errors in the application / compliance process as the information is taken back into practice management systems and ensures suitability/demands and needs documents and compliance history aligns with the application.
The full process is reduced by 54 per cent as a result of the linked-up journey. Many of the newer application processes are fully signatureless, including trust forms.
