Axa plans to catch up to its competitors by making it easier and faster for financial advisers to write life insurance.
The life office has followed a string of Australian insurers by rolling out an electronic application software solution.
“We have to slightly catch up with our competitors,” Axa individual life head Stephen Rosengren said
“[The electronic application process] is the first step to moving towards catching up with straight through processing and underwriting. The next step is including an underwriting engine then we will look at our whole service offering.”
The Axa desk top application software was rolled out by its risk development managers in February.
The tool instantly generates insurance quotes for all Axa individual insurance plans.
In March, 30 per cent of new applications were submitted electronically.
Axa is the second largest provider of income protection and sixth for term life and total, permanent disability cover.
“We want to be back in the top three in terms of net insurance premium by 2012,” Rosengren said.
Aviva has Riskfirst, Zurich uses electronic application hub AppCentral and Macquarie Life has retail insurance product suite FutureWise.
ING Australia also has an electronic application, OneCare Express, while listed life office Tower Australia has electronic application technology, Tower Accelerate.
