Kyobo Life Insurance Co. has been working on a project to find new growth engines by mixing digital technologies with life insurance services.
The company, for the first time, mixed Blockchain with its insurance service for the first time in the life insurance industry. The company adopted Blockchain and IoT for certification in paying small insurance claims to life insurance policy holders.
Applying blockchain technology to the insurance business will significantly improve customer convenience, said Chung Kyu-shik, senior manager of Kyobo Life Insurance's fintech taskforce.
Blockchain refers to a decentralized electronic ledger technology which gained fame as it underpins the digital currency of Bitcoin. Convenience from the life insurance service mixed with Blockchain technology is that insurers don’t have to visit insurance companies to submit paperwork to get their medical papers before getting insurance money paid.
The life insurance firm signed cooperative agreements with three hospitals in Seoul to conduct tests on payments of insurance claims automatically. The company plans to extend the service to large- and medium-scale hospitals across the country following tests with its employees.
Recently, the life insurer launched the Smart Family Analysis System using Blockchain and Scrapping technologies. By using the two digital technologies, the system allows a look at the details of the life insurance contracts signed with rival life insurers without the danger of having them exposed, providing “One Stop Insurance Consulting” services. The service allows customers to decide what kind of life insurance policies to sign up for before deciding on the life insurance policies they need, as they can clearly see the details of other life insurance policies through the system.
Kyobo Life announced on April 19 that the life insurer was finally selected as an operator of the government’s pilot blockchain project to lay the foundation for the internet of things (IoT).
According to Kyobo Life, this project is a pilot blockchain project conducted by the National Information Society Agency under the management of the Ministry of Science, ICT and Future Planning for IoT promotion. When a company with a service development capability in its sector forms a consortium and takes part in the project, the government provides some money for the company.
The consortium is composed of Kyobo Life along with specialist D. Lemon, blockchain technology company theloop, and the hospital medical record service company One.
The core technology that they will develop and implement is that of providing a service which enables automatic payments of small amounts of insurance money, such as indemnity insurance payouts, to policyholders by using blockchain and simple IoT authentication technology.
In the past, if there was a reason for the payment of insurance money, the policyholder must submit various supporting documents to his or her insurance company to receive insurance money. However, when blockchain technology is used for the payment of insurance benefits and even when the policyholder does not charge insurance money, the details of the payment of medical fees for hospitals and his or her insurance contract information in the insurance company are automatically authenticated and the insurance money is automatically paid to the policyholder even if the payment of the insurance money is not demanded first.
The Kyobo Life Consortium will conclude an agreement with major hospitals in the Seoul metropolitan area and conduct a pilot project targeting small amounts of insurance money under 300,000 won ($270) by the end of this year. After a stabilization phase, Kyobo Life plans to expand its services to all Kyobo Life customers across the nation.
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