About Shri Satyajit Tripathy
Government of India has appointed Shri Satyajit Tripathy on 4th September 2021 as Chairman-cum-Managing Director of United India Insurance Company Limited, the second largest Public Sector General Insurance Company .
A graduate of College of Agriculture – OUAT, Shri Tripathy completed his PGDM from XIMB. He joined the General Insurance Corporation of India(GIC) in 1988 as a Direct Recruit Officer and worked across East, North and Western Regions. From 2002 – 2006, he served in the newly formed Agriculture Insurance Company of India at New Delhi.
In GIC, he worked across various Departments like Investment, Crop Insurance, Motor, Marine, Aviation, Miscellaneous, HR &Training and Investor Relations. He was Chief Investment Officer at GIC from 2015-2018.
He was elected as Director & General Manager of The New India Assurance Company Ltd, in August,2021.
He has travelled overseas extensively in matters relating to Reinsurance.
Q. IRDAI under its new leadership has been very proactive over the last few months to promote the growth of Insurance sector and reduce regulatory compliance. Do you think insurance industry is poised for transformation in coming days?
The kind of reforms and the speed at which these reforms have been introduced is a clear indication of the Regulator trying to make it easier for new entrants to come in which will mean more capital to fuel the growth of the insurance industry.
The regulatory compliance has also been reduced to promote the ease of doing business. All this along with the recent changes will help the industry grow and reach its target of becoming the fifth largest insurance industry over the next few years.
These reforms are progressive, forward looking and facilitative.
Q. What are the areas in general insurance industry where you forsee growth momentum in terms of opportunity and new business?
The insurance penetration for general insurance is quite low at 1% considering the population of 1.4 billion in the country. There is tremendous scope for growth.
With the entry of newer players and the powers given to the Product management committee there is scope for companies to churn out new products targeted towards different sections of society.
The needs of the millennial are different from the needs of the rural poor. Various products targeting the different sections of society are on the anvil.
We intend to tap the rural segment, the SMEs and the millennial to push for sales of our products.
We have recently launched a low priced fire policy called United Value policy which offers multiple add ons along with the fire cover.
We have also launched a health cover targeted towards the younger population keeping the cost low. We are also working on a cyber-cover which we expect to launch in the near fixture.
Q. According to you what is the biggest challenge insurance industry is facing today?
The biggest challenge continues to be the lack of awareness about insurance perse. The common man continues to perceive it as a complex and expensive product and there is a little trust deficit also, as the customer is not sure if his claim will be honoured.
For most of the customers insurance is not perceived as a necessity even in today’s times. The segment which is really in need of cover i.e the missing middle or the 30% of the population numbering 40 crores of Indians do not have any cover as per Niti-ayog’s report of 2021 on “Health insurance for India’s missing middle”. We therefore have a large segment of population which can be brought under the ambit of insurance through a more focused approach.
The Pandemic however helped to create more awareness and we saw a huge demand for health policies which is continuing even today. There is also a demand for low cost simple health covers and health covers with higher limits.
Top priority needs to be accorded for creating greater awareness about insurance and reaching out to people in every nook and corner of the country.
Simple products which are easy to understand is the need of the day.
Q. What has been the USP of United India Insurance Company in terms of product and services?
UIIC has a whole bouquet of products targeted towards different sections of society and Industries.
We have over 200 products which are available for the customers and we will be adding newer products over the next few months.
There is a growing demand for cyber insurance and we are working on a cyber-insurance product which will be introduced shortly.
There is a new Health product designed for the younger population as their insurance needs are very different from the other customers.
We have also introduced a new United Value Fire insurance policy which is a low priced Fire policy with a host of add ons.
As the Indian customer is very price sensitive and looks for more value adds we have been designing more low priced covers for them in property insurance and health insurance. We are confident of the sales of these products picking up once we publicize these products.
Tremendous progress has been made in use of Technology for the distribution of products and servicing of claims. We have a 100 % digital process in place for handling of motor claims.
We also have a robust grievance redressalmechanisn in place and our grievance disposal ratio is 99.87% for 2022-2023.
Q. Can you share any recent initiative or innovations that United India Insurance has implemented to serve its customers better?
Proactive steps are being taken in our Company to improve the claim settlement process. UIIC has received the Award for Best Digital Transformation by Banking frontiers. During the Current Year, we have implemented the below Initiatives under Motor Insurance.
Automatic Appointment of Surveyor in Claims up to Rs 10 Lac.
Utilising the services of Loss Assessment Agencies for inspection/survey of small claims.
Formation of Rapid Claims Settlement Cell at Patna, Delhi and Chandigarh to settle claims uptoRs. 75000.
Centralization and Digitization to achieve 100 % Paperless Settlement.
Substantial enhancement of Financial powers to RO/HUBS.
Launch of 38 new Motor Third Party Claims Hubs across country to centralize TP Claims.
We have digitized the proposal forms in Health line of business. All policies sold through on line customer portal or intermediary portal are having simplified digital proposal forms. Every effort is made to simplify the proposal forms and simplify the process for obtaining the policies for retail clients.
Q. IRDA has allowed more tie-ups for corporate insurance agents and individual agents. How will this benefit your company in terms of increasing the reach and business Also IRDA has recently removed the cap on insurance commission what will be its impact?
More tie-ups for corporate insurance agents and individual agents by IRDAI
For us it is more of an opportunity than a challenge. This would be a great opportunity as we have over 200 products which very few companies can boast of. These products cater to different segments of customers and cater to different needs of customers and industries.
This move would therefore help us to push sales of our existing products through a wider network of agents.
Removal of cap on insurance commission by IRDAI
This is a welcome move and a long awaited one. Earlier we were offering a fixed commission for all LOBs irrespective of whether it was profitable or not. We were unable to incentivize the agents and Intermediaries for the good segments.
With the new Commission Regulations Insurers will now have greater flexibility to decide which segments they would like to incentivize and promote.
Insurers will now be able to allocate their resources and target the under penetrated areas which is vital for achieving growth and profitability.
Q. The growth of risk management culture in India has been muted, though after covid companies are realising its importance and taking suitable measures. what development do you expect in this space?
IRDAI is working towards Risk Based Capital (RBC) and all insurers will undertake huge initiatives in Risk Management arena in the coming period. The regulator is working on a proposal to move towards a risk-based capital framework to ensure optimum utilisation of capital, in line with the practice adopted by other countries. IRDAI is also working towards revamping the supervision framework that will be based on risk enabled by technology.
Industry will be moving towards RBC structure from the current solvency principle regime. A shift in regime was felt because the current solvency based rules do not help in assessing whether the capital held is adequate enough for the risks inherent in the insurance business.
Q. IRDAI is planning to issue licence to more players in coming years. Do you think competition will intensify further and lead to more competitive pricing?
With the entry of newer players competition will intensify, however the powers given to the Product management committee, there is scope for companies to churn out new products targeted towards different sections of society.
For us it is more of an opportunity than a challenge. This would be a great opportunity as we have over 200 products which very few companies can boast of. These products cater to different segments of customers and cater to different needs of customers and industries.
As the Indian customer is very price sensitive and looks for more value adds we have been designing more low priced covers for them in property insurance and health insurance.
Q. Do you think climate change is going to pose a bigger risk than the Pandemic for regulators and it is high time for regulators and insurers to gear up for the future challenges?
Yes, Climate Change is leading to natural Calamities, which have resulted in increase in reinsurance cost for property insurance.
We understand from GIC that they were rating Property treaty Programmes like Risk XL, CAT XL, etc based on ‘Experience Rating’. From Financial Year 2022-23 onwards, our lead Reinsurer GIC-Re has started Exposure based rating as per the requirements of International Market.
This has resulted in substantial increase in our treaty costs for the current year and we expect the same trend to continue for the years to come.
Huge loss of life and property arising out of CAT events also puts a greater strain on public resources so in a country like India it is imperative that people have an insurance cover to fall back on.
Q. Do you think insurance Industry must focus more in the area of Research and development and invest in education / awareness for its employees and consumers to achieve the overall growth objective?
Yes, Industry must focus more on R&D and the regulator is to facilitating the process. Approval of new products can now be done at the PMC’s end. This path breaking regulatory change for new products approval would work towards empowering insurance companies in coming out with new products with greater speed. The needs of our customers are changing with time and we have to gear up to offer them more customized solutions for their needs whether it is a cyber crime policy or a package policy for the rural poor or simplified packaged products which will address all their needs in a single shot.
In a company like ours where we have a plethora of products there is a need for us to create more awareness about our products within our own employees so that they in turn can disseminate the information to the Agents and Intermediaries.
There is also a need to educate our marketing force about the products available at our end as most of them tend to focus only on Motor, Health, Fire and PA policies.
We also have to publicize the details of all our products to create interest amongst our existing customers and prospective customers.
Q. How do you see the insurance industry evolving in the next 5 to 10 years ?
To bring India’s insurance penetration and density at par with global standards, the Regulator has already set a goal of lnsurance for all by 2047.
The insurance industry in India is currently witnessing tremendous growth due to growing income, increasing awareness especially post covid and the technological developments.
There is a huge potential for growth in India as the insurance penetration for Non-life sector is currently only 1%.
2022-2023 will go down as a watershed year for the insurance industry in view of the slew of reforms introduced by the Regulator to improve insurance penetration, increase capital flow, improve valuation and facilitate more innovations. These reforms are progressive, forward looking and facilitative.
The growth engines which we foresee for the next 5-10 years are as follows:
Massive expansion in Health Insurance segment by tapping the huge potential in Indian market, will help in achieving the Regulator’s mission — “Insurance for all by the year 2047”.
Product packaging and product innovation will lead to enlarged growth in all lines of business.
Digitization will be one of the key growth engine which will help in last mile delivery of insurance products.
Huge infrastructure spends by Govt. and Make in India initiatives will drive growth in the property insurance segment.
AI driven data analytics will bring about rationalization of claim cost and fraud control.
Q. Any other development you would like to share?
Insurer tech is the buzz word going forward and companies are going big way to adopt for business growth. Robotic process automation can automate repetitive processes both in underwriting and claims thus delivering faster service, improving efficiency and reducing time and cost. AI driven chatbots can assist customer in their journey from seeking cover information, assisted form filling, KYC process, policy generation, claims assistance.
We are looking forward to an exciting 2023-2024. It will be very interesting to see how the market responds to the changes introduced by the Regulator. We are quite charged up and intend to stay focused on our Tag line “Service is the Gateway to Growth.
