© The Indian Express Pvt Ltd
Tags:
Journalism of Courage
Insurance regulator IRDAI has formed a steering committee, which will act as the apex decision making body for creation of its ambitious Bima Sugam platform, and it indicated that it will soon appoint a project consultant for which Request for Proposal (RFP) has already been issued.
While Bima Sugam will enable individuals to buy a life, health, motor or property insurance policies online, its implementation has now been postponed thrice. The platform will enable easy access under a single roof for insurance companies, agents, brokers, banks and even aggregators.
The platform will act as a centralised database which will assist consumers with all insurance related queries. It will also pave the way for a speedy acceptance of new or sandbox products.
After changing the deadline twice, the regulator has now set a new deadline of July 2024 for its “game changing” Bima Sugam project to go live and has for the first time unveiled the entire spectrum of services to be provided by this mega tech project. It will be a centralised marketplace and a one-stop-shop for all insurance-related queries, including policy purchase, claim settlement, insurance advice and grievance redressal.
The steering committee is comprised of Rakesh Joshi, Member, Finance and Investment, IRDAI, Anup Bagchi, MD & CEO ICICI Prudential Life Insurance, Naveen Tahilyani, MD & CEO, Tata AIA Life Insurance, Mahesh Balasubramanian, MD & CEO, Kotak Life Insurance, Nilesh Garg, MD & CEO, Tata AIG General Insurance, Prasun Sikdar, MD& CEO, Manipal Cigna Health Insurance, Inderjeet Singh, Secretary General, General Insurance Council and Satyendra Nath Bhattacharya, Secretary General, Life Insurance Council.
Further, Cyril Amarchand Mangaldas (CAM) has been appointed as the legal counsel for the project. Responsibilities of CAM will include incorporation of Section 8 not-for-profit company which will be the company owning the Bima Sugam platform. The platform will support all personal and commercial/business insurance requirements and support in identifying and comparing optimal products to meet user requirements within stipulated timelines. The entire spectrum of insurance offerings through the platform will include life insurance and all its variants — term plans, savings (Par and Non-Par), annuity and pension plans — ULIP products, health insurance and all its variants, vehicle insurance (TP and OD), travel insurance, personal accident insurance, property insurance, commercial insurance, marine insurance, agricultural insurance and any other insurance product planned to be listed on the platform as decided by the two councils.
The platform will have to demonstrate end-to-end digital on-boarding journey for all insurance products without any manual interventions, including customer acquisition and lead management, customer onboarding, application management, documentation, risk management, underwriting process, policy issuance, customer service management, analytics and MIS and user interface.
The project consultant will be responsible for end-to-end ideation, design and development of the Bima Sugam platform. The platform will have an easy-to-use interface for the online users to easily access the information on the portal, help them in making a decision towards purchase of policy and also support them in servicing of the policy purchased from the platform
