Online insurer ZhongAn uses artificial intelligence to improve its products

China’s first online-only insurance technology company, ZhongAn Online Property & Casualty, said it aims to raise its service quality by using artificial intelligence for the pricing of products, underwriting, fraud detection and customer services.

“Machine learning can optimise the quality of customer service, so the development of AI in the insurance industry will certainly be a big trend,” said Wayne Xu, the company’s chief operating officer.

“At the same time, our young customers are also more comfortable using computer-related services and communication rather than going through phone exchanges.”

Ninety-seven per cent of ZhongAn’s customer queries are directed to its “chat bot” communication tool without any involvement of humans. A chat bot, short for chat robot, is a computer program designed to simulate human conversation, and typically evolves at a faster pace than human client representatives.

AI can also result in more accurate and personalised pricing for customers than using traditional approaches that rely on humans, whose capability is confined to the level of their training and experiences, he said.

ZhongAn, which was established last year, is known for offering products unheard of in other markets. These were designed with the help of cutting-edge financial technologies that use artificial intelligence and machine learning, Xu said.