This article was produced in partnership with KAVA CRM and Omnisure Insurance
Omnisure Insurance, a Sydney based brokerage, recently decided to tackle some critical issues. Their partly digitized processes needed updating and integrating to better serve customers and offer business insights. Mindful of the talent crunch, the brokerage was also looking to perform administrative tasks more efficiently.
Managing director, Schalk Van Der Merwe (pictured below), has always focused his business around the client experience. He wanted a new technology strategy that answered his firm’s challenges while taking into account Ominsure’s customer centric vision.
Van Der Merwe teamed up with KAVA CRM, a specialist insurance technology firm with more than a decade’s experience providing CRM solutions for the industry.
KAVA’s director, GJ Wechgelaer, understood what was required.
“Everything Omnisure does is customer centric so that’s how we approached their whole digital transformation journey,” he said.
KAVA provides a purpose-built CRM system designed to deal holistically with an insurance brokerage’s operation from new business to policy renewals and claims. KAVA also integrates with systems like INSIGHT, Winbeat and LMI to drive efficiencies into insurance processes.
“I think it's completely transforming our business,” said Van Der Merwe.
Omnisure’s managing director said he quickly realised that KAVA CRM had “immense capabilities.”
The back end of the business, he said, is now fully automated with insurance processes that are integrated, faster and much easier to use for customers and employees.
The new system also overcomes their major challenge, said Van Der Merwe, of integrating all of their different systems.
“It doesn't just deal with one of our problems, it takes care of multiple problems, which is the reason why we jumped at it,” he said.
Van Der Merwe said their new document management system is a good example. Previously, Omnisure used a separate document management program, a separate online filing system, separate CRM and a separate form technology.
“From a CRM point of view, we've gone from having three different software platforms supporting our business to one,” he said.
Van Der Merwe explained other major pluses.
“We have our INSIGHT program which does all of our financial transactional stuff like invoicing and negotiation with the underwriters and trust account management,” he said.
The Omnisure managing director said the CRM now allows him to see a live feed of all the data coming in from their brokers.
“But when that data is in there it’s what I can do with that data which makes this CRM solution really attractive,” he said.
New customers also enter the system far more easily than before.
“When a client completes an online inquiry form they are automatically created as a new prospect in our CRM,” said Van Der Merwe.
The right forms and documents are now built into their system and can easily be sent to clients with completion instructions. There’s no need for clunky PDFs.
“Another issue we are able to solve was the lack of good form technology. He said PDF documents “don’t really go down well with customers.”
Omnisure now has, for example, its own customised professional indemnity forms, appropriate for their customers and the industry segments they serve.
“We've designed it with our underwriters in mind so that means we've never had any submissions where an insurer has said they don't have enough information,” said Merwe.
He describes Omnisure’s documents as very conversational rather than a list of items.
“Clients seem to respond pretty well to that,” he added.
The brokerage can also do much more with the information.
“When clients complete the forms you can have that information filter through to your CRM, update certain details and trigger off certain workflows in your systems,” said Van Der Merwe.
They’re also saving a lot of time on each and every quote.
“Just from the point of view of more efficient documentation it's probably saving us 10 to 15 minutes each time,” he said.
Van Der Merwe said they’re now a much more “tech focused” business.
“I think we now have capabilities at our fingertips never enjoyed before by a smaller brokerage,” he said.
Wechgelaer sees his successful partnership with Omnisure as a case study in how to undertake a digital transformation journey.
“That’s the exciting part here: specialists in insurance and technology teaming up to, at the end of the day, deliver an amazing client experience,” he said.
To learn more, visit KAVA CRM and Omnisure Insurance.
Schalk Van Der Merwe has a passion for delivering excellent outcomes for clients. With an array of awards under his belt, Schalk is a well-known name in the insurance industry and recognised as one of Australia’s top insurance brokers. As the company’s managing director, Schalk oversees the company’s health, overall success and growth. Omnisure was founded in 2000. After 13 years’ experience as a broker and six years as a director, Schalk stepped into the managing director role in 2020. Under his leadership the company is recognised as one of Australia’s leading boutique insurance brokerages.
