Swiss Re announced on April 15 the launch of an enhanced version of Magnum, its automated life and health underwriting system.
This innovative solution enables Swiss Re’s Life & Health clients to take underwriting decisions on an automated basis without referring to an underwriter. This saves time and money and improves customer relationships. Magnum provides full access to Swiss Re’s leading underwriting expertise,and gives life insurers the strategic information they need to grow their risk business profitably.
Says Christian Mumenthaler, Swiss Re’s Head of Life & Health: “The need for life insurers to use fast technological solutions is essential to ensuring that consumers can buy protection cover quickly and efficiently. Magnum helps our clients to turn risk into profitable growth, giving them an advantage in an increasingly competitive environment.” With more than 15 years of development and primary insurers in 16 countries using Magnum to assess new applications for life, critical illness and disability insurance, the system already processes more than 1.5 million policies every year.
Several insurance companies have already opted to use Swiss Re’s enhanced automated underwriting system. Milton Jennings, CEO of Fidelity Life in New Zealand, said: “We need an underwriting solution that helps us compete in the demanding independent financial adviser market. After considering other offerings, we chose Magnum partly because it will get more business on the books, faster and more cost-effectively. It’s also scalable in line with our business needs and those of our distributors.” Paul Hately, Swiss Re’s global Head of Magnum, added: “We are delighted to add Fidelity to our client list and are pleased with our advanced pipeline for further new Magnum implementations in continental Europe, Asia and the UK. Customers chose Magnum to gain access to Swiss Re’s team of experts – people who can support them in reviewing and interpreting their data. This goes well beyond the analysis typically available from a traditional software provider.”
Swiss Re has enhanced Magnum in order to provide its life insurance clients with a detailed view on how their underwriting performance compares with market trends. In turn, this helps to improve performance across a range of underwriting methods and distribution channels as well as to develop new products and reduce costs. According to Swiss Re’s research publication Underwriting Watch 2009, Magnum clients enjoy the highest level of point-of-sale acceptance rates compared with other systems available in the market. In the UK, Magnum clients have been able to raise decisions taken without referral to well over 70% of the total. This compares to the market norm of 40%. The new Magnum provides Swiss Re’s clients with better workflow efficiency and allows for higher acceptances of underwriting decisions at the frontline.
