Suncorp has taken home gold at the 2024 Australian AI Awards, earning recognition for its innovative and collaborative use of conversational AI to deliver greater flexibility, simplicity, and connections with its insurance customers.
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Simplicity, speed and convenience – three things customers demand from their insurer, and three things Suncorp has been recognised for in the inaugural 2024 Australian AI Awards.
Suncorp’s work with conversational AI and its implementation across sales, customer service and claims functions saw the insurer take out top award in the AI Innovator – Wealth Management category.
Customer-facing digital innovations highlighted in the award include a new state-of-the-art insurance sales flow for Shannons motor insurance customers, an AI-enabled real-time motor claims progress tracker, and a user-friendly insurance policy management tool.
Conversational AI vs Generative AI
Conversational AI creates two-way, ‘human-like’ interactions via text or speech (such as a customer engaging with an online chatbot, or Amazon Alexa, Apple Siri and Google Home). Generative AI creates original content from prompts given by humans (such as ChatGPT).
Suncorp’s Head of Digital Customer Vlad Vereshchagin said: “AI is a powerful tool that is almost limitless in its ability to drive positive impact. Whereas the use of AI to provide a targeted, precise support at the time of a customer’s need becomes the real game changer.”
Suncorp Head of Digital Customer Vlad Vereshchagin
Digital experience is great at providing broad coverage and support to customers, inviting them to self-serve anytime at their own pace.
With conversational AI we get a real opportunity to truly personalise our offerings, reduce cognitive load for customers and ultimately help them get to where they are heading much faster.
Here are some examples of award-winning, customer-facing AI in action across Suncorp:
AI in action – purchasing insurance with Shannons Virtual Assistant
Shannons is Australia's leading insurance provider for motoring enthusiasts including owners of classic or historic cars. Historically, adding a vehicle to an existing motor insurance policy was executed over the phone.
However, the new conversational AI solution in Shannons Virtual Assistant chatbot helps a customer purchase a policy efficiently through an online chatbot.
The solution uses AI to digress and answer policy questions, while collecting information conversationally, similarly to the way a motoring underwriter would with a customer over the phone.
The flow of conversation has automated complex underwriting rules and exemptions relevant to classic and vintage car insurance cover, meaning a customer can have their policy updated faster than before.
AI in action – A single view of a motor claim
One of Suncorp’s newest conversational AI innovations aims to keep customers up to date with the progress of their motor claim, via an easily accessible web portal or mobile app chat which is convenient and intuitive for customers to use.
Historically, the detailed tracking of a motor claim progress has been one of the biggest customer pain points.
“Motor claims progress through a complex process,” Mr Vereshchagin said. “A lot is happening in the backend of our systems; there are a lot of people working on the claim and on the vehicle.
“We wanted to show customers what is happening and present it to them as an easy-to-understand, chronological summary of their claims process.”
As changes occur in the claims system, customer query responses are updated in real-time, providing a robust and comprehensive source of information which is equivalent to a call centre team member’s response.
With the fast pace of technological change, Suncorp remains committed to providing innovative, seamless and engaging experiences to all customers throughout all interactions.
Suncorp is not new to AI and has progressively applied it across several targeted use cases in pricing, claims, risk modelling, customer service, automation and virtual chatbots for many years.
Suncorp Chief Information Officer Adam Bennett said the past financial year had been significant for the scale of technology achievements.
Suncorp Chief Information Officer Adam Bennett
This year we have successfully completed several significant, long running technology transformation programs.
Not only have these programs reduced risk and delivered tangible customer benefits, but they have also created the strong foundations for our new strategy and business plan, that is anchored in platform modernisation and AI.
Building off this momentum, the latest FY25-27 plan continues the multi-year journey for Suncorp to extract value by leveraging AI, including GenAI across the enterprise for both efficiency and greater customer engagement.
“Looking ahead, our technology vision is to utilise AI (including GenAI), together with simplified and modernised technology platforms, to deliver superior experiences to our customers and people,” Mr Bennett said.
