After ruffling some feathers in the South African insurance industry, insurtech start-up company Everything.Insure has set its sights on expanding its operations to India.
This was revealed by Mishaya Chettiar, executive head of Everything.Insure, in a video interview with ITWeb TV.
Everything.Insure is a digital insurance marketplace that places different insurers and their quotes on one portal for consumers to pick one that best suits them.
It competes with the likes of Hippo, a website that compares the prices and benefits of a range of insurance, medical aid and personal finance providers.
“Everything.Insure was started as an idea on a whiteboard in 2017, when we started mapping out how we can change the insurance industry, how to digitise it and change the way the whole industry works,” she said.
“It officially launched to the public late last year. We started doing some advertisements in February this year and we have a full marketing plan rollout for the rest of this year.”
According to Chettiar, Everything.Insure is a digital insurance marketplace. “We don’t just do personal insurance; we do business insurance, pets, funeral – all categories of insurance. You go on the platform, answer a few questions and you will be presented with multiple quotes from the top insurers.
“One of the main things that Everything.Insure does is we curate the insurance industry and we only put the best insurers on the platform.
“You are able to compare your insurance products and pick the one that suits you, and you can tailor your insurance product. The biggest difference with us is that you can actually buy that product online, meaning no phone calls and paperwork.
“Once you have bought your insurance product, we have got everything central, on web and app, where you house all your insurance products regardless of insurer. We are not an insurance company; we are the marketplace for those insurance companies.”
Earlier this year, Everything.Insure launched a social media series to educate consumers about the insurance industry, including posts about how it differs from other insurtech firms and traditional brokers. In the video, the company explained the differences between Everything.Insure and Hippo.
Hippo filed a legal complaint with the High Court in March, claiming the post was defamatory and misleading. The case was later dropped by Hippo.
Explained Chettiar: “As part of our vision as Everything.Insure, one of the things that we wanted to achieve was to demystify insurance for consumers. Insurance can be overwhelming to understand; sometimes you don’t even know what you are buying, and in most cases, people go to a broker.
“We were trying to help people understand the difference between us and the various players in the insurance industry.”
Chettiar believes Everything.Insure has ruffled some feathers in the local insurance industry.
“That wasn’t our intention though. We are not trying to form any enemies or ruffle any feathers; we are just trying to be an advocate for the consumer. We are agnostic, we don’t care which insurer you buy from; we just want to help you understand what you are buying and give you more options. And if a few people get offended along the way, we are on the side of the consumer.”
To grow the business from a product perspective, Chettiar says Everything.Insure is trying to add products and product providers on the platform every week.
“We need to have a wide variety, from medical insurance, life, etc. We are meeting with insurers all the time. As you can imagine, it’s a long process to get big trusted insurers to agree to be in an open marketplace sort of platform.
“A few years ago, we got our licence [to operate] in India. So, we are in the process of building Everything.Insure in India and we also have a few other plans outside of South Africa. For the Indian market, we are aiming to launch this year, or early next year.”
Click here to watch the full video.
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