COVID-19 dampens consumer trust in insurance, finds survey

The global coronavirus outbreak has dampened the trust insureds and small and medium-sized businesses had in insurance companies, reveals a new survey by the Chartered Insurance Institute (CII).

The survey, conducted among 1000 consumers and 1000 SMEs in both October 2019 and January-February 2020, found that the overall consumer and SME satisfaction with insurance increased slightly between 2019 and February 2020.

Loyalty, complaint handling, ease of doing business and assessing risk individually was ranked by SMEs as more important when buying and renewing insurance.

For consumers, loyalty, speed of claims, price and complaints handling were ranked as more important.

The poll showed that knowing exactly what an insurance policy covered and excluded was one of the most important factors for both consumers and SMEs.

According to Matt Connell, director of policy and public affairs of the CII, it will be interesting to see how consumers' and SMEs' confidence in insurance will be affected by their experience during coronavirus, particularly relating to travel and business interruption claims.

Connell said: “The CII Public Trust Index is the only index that tracks public trust in insurance for consumers and SMEs on a quarterly basis. The data that we have gathered will form an important baseline so that we can understand the impact on trust in insurance of recent events, when we publish the next round of results in the summer.”

“In addition, the CII trust index is the only index that identifies issues with trust in insurance – such as the confidence people have that all their relevant risks are covered, or the speed in which claims are paid – and identify ways in which insurers can change the way they operate to improve trust in future. As a result, we expect the trust tool to play a key role in improving trust in insurance through 2020 and beyond,” he added.