Westpac is officially the first business to make
CoreLogic’s Cordell Sum Sure available to its customers and staff, making banks the winners over insurance companies in the race to ease the process of calculating sum insured values.
The system is designed to quickly calculate the reconstruction cost value of most homes, often by simply entering in the property address, making it an invaluable tool for insurance companies, financial institutions and homeowners alike.
The need for an improved calculation process was underlined following the move by most New Zealand insurance companies to introduce nominated sum insured cover following the Canterbury earthquakes.
CoreLogic already had its Sum Sure offering but the platform received a considerable boost when the company acquired Cordell in October 2015 and the calculator was re-engineered to become easier to use, and based on technology that most insurance companies were already familiar with.
CoreLogic’s insurance solutions director
Richard Deakin said Westpac’s insurance team was quick to spot the benefits of the system from very early on.
“They were the first to incorporate it into their sales processes both online, in their call centre and in branch,” he told
Insurance Business.
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“They recognised the potential improvements to the sales process and customer experience.”
While earthquakes had triggered the initial move to sum insured policies, ironically Deakin said it was now the Kaikoura earthquakes that had caused delays for other businesses to adopt the improved calculating system.
“We are in discussions with the insurance community, although quite rightly their focus has been on their response to the Kaikoura quakes,” he explained.
While Westpac customers have been able to use the calculator since September, the bank had held off actively promoting it due to the cover embargo following the Kaikoura earthquakes.
Daniel Arbidans, senior product manager, insurance, at Westpac NZ, said it was the improved customer experience that attracted them to it.
“We know through customer and staff surveys that establishing a rebuild cost for insurance purposes was a real pain point in the process,” he told
Insurance Business.
“Customers didn’t know enough detail about their homes and staff found the process time-consuming.
“We tested Cordell Sum Sure and were impressed with the feedback.”
Since officially introducing it, staff are now able to have much more meaningful conversations with customers, he said.
The bank was keen to underline the issue of underinsurance and had also taken pains to explain the difference between reconstruction cost and market value while pointing to the fact that Cordell Sum Sure used a similar process as a quantity surveyor or builder might use.
“We hope that tools like this can help close the underinsurance gap in New Zealand so that if/when another large disaster strikes more customers have the protection they need to rebuild their homes and move on with their lives,” Arbidans said.
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