Interviewer, Amy, speaks to Néstor Alonso who tells us more about Driverly' plans to transform the way we approach and use insurance.
Why did you decide to start Driverly?
Armin, whom I know very well personally and professionally from our experience in Admiral Group, came to me with the original idea. At the time, I was the Chief Data and Underwriting Officer of a telematics-based start-up company in Spain, so I already knew a lot about telematics and the start-up world. Expanding this experience into the UK market, which is greatly attractive in many ways, with a friend and top talent like Armin, plus owning part of the business, made it a no-brainer for me.
How does Driverly plan to use data in order to retain customers?
Our 100% telematics book will make it very easy for good drivers to remain with us for a long time, if they so wish. Not only will they see their policy having better prices month after month, but their good driving will be rewarded with acorns, which they can then exchange for Amazon vouchers. In the future, we plan for customers to also be able to exchange their collected acorns into many other rewards such as cash, shopping vouchers, charity donations and insurance discounts. On top of that, a Driverly Club formed by people with a history of good driving will receive even higher rewards in acorns.
How does Driverly plan to use data differently from the more established brands?
Gamification and reward are two good examples: we’ll put our customers’ data to work for them as well as for us. Many companies out there put people’s data to work mainly for them, we want it to work for our customers too. Even Driverly users who are not customers can benefit from our Acorn scheme. Another very good differentiator is that our technology will allow us to use data in order to proactively incentivise claims reduction. By letting our customers know and rewarding choices of lower-risk behaviours, we’ll contribute to overall accident reduction, making our roads safer for everyone.
How will you use data resource to better price products?
All our policies will be telematics. Combined with our monthly subscription policy, we’ll be able to cleanse the book from reckless drivers much earlier than other insurers, and reward good drivers much earlier than other insurers too. We’ll have many more variables for each customer, which means that we’ll have more data, and for all our policies. This, combined with our proprietary technology, will help us understand our customers and their factors much better in order to allow for better pricing.
What challenges is the market facing when it comes to data?
Most policies in the market belong to companies who move slowly. New players like Driverly can quickly adapt to new data opportunities thanks to more flexible technology. Another problem is data silos, which makes it very difficult to build a full 360-degree vision of the customer and use it to develop a customer-centric culture. Finally, it’s important to make the customer understand that he/she will get from his/her data as much value as us. We are a no-fee company, while others keep charging high and annoying fees at the same time as they have much more data about their customers, which would (in theory) allow them to understand (and treat) their customers better; for example, reducing fees. We transferred this advantage to our customers by design, creating a no-fee company from scratch.
How does Driverly plan to use machine learning in order to change insurance for young drivers?
Machine learning algorithms are already part of much of the technology we are using. Any new algorithm that makes sense and helps us as well as our customers will make it into our stack, whether it is part of our Customer Support, Pricing, Underwriting, Marketing, Telematics, Claims or any other aspect of the business.