AWESOME ADJUSTING REVISITED: A Return to Customer Service
by Paul Prochaska
Claims magazine, Feb 2000

Many insurance companies are looking for the type of training that can truly enhance customer service by not only drastically improving their retention rate, but gaining new business through referrals. The tricky part is developing techniques that not only improve the customer’s impression of how they have been treated, but actually save the time of the claims staff.

A new partnership between one national insurer and an international insurance training organization is trying to accomplish this task with a training program based on returning customer service to the top of the priorities lists for adjusters. Progressive Insurance, based in Mayfield Heights, Ohio, recently teamed up with the International Insurance Institute ^SM, in Sacramento, Calif., to develop a high-powered customer service course for all 6,000 of Progressive claims people.

Progressive, itself, has long been recognized as one of the leaders in developing systems for rapid claims handling and the initiator of the “Immediate Response” concept. Under this program, the claims department encourages insureds to report all losses as soon as possible, even at the scene of an accident, so an adjuster can be dispatched directly to the location in order to offer the highest possible claims service upon initial contact.

Since the customer service training program was established, many business units within Progressive have reported immediate improvement in the areas stressed in class, so much so that an internal bulletin board was created for Progressive employees to post their success. Example after example are listed by claims people outlining the application of the customer service techniques.

Stann Rose, Progessive’s Head of Claims for California, and co-champion of the nationwide customer service project, was looking for a program that went far beyond the basics of customer service. “We have the basics down,” Rose said. “We want to raise the bar of claims customer service to a higher level. For our claims employees, customer service must be at the forefront of everything they do. That means training at much higher levels of customer service than what is traditional in the industry.”

“There is more to customer service than just making a fair and quick settlement,” said Tom Schmitt, Progressive’s human resources director and co-developer of the project. “We were looking for something that could help our people also excel at the other aspects of customer service, such as listening, empathy, reassurance and an appreciation that customer service is not just part of their job, but is their job.”

Origins in Claims.

The origins of the customer service program began with this magazine in 1996, when Carl Van, President and CEO of the International Insurance Institute, and Sue Tarrach, Assistant Vice President of CalFarm Insurance, co-authored an article entitled, “The Eight Characteristics of Awesome Adjusters” [See Claims, December 1996, p.28]. To date, Claims has received requests from numerous claims associations and companies requesting reproduction permission for their newsletters.

The article created interest in less-focused-upon areas of adjuster’s success, most notably, customer service. Brad Baumann, Executive Vice President of International Insurance Institute, strongly supported the concept of developing a high-level customer service training program, and pushed it onto the development table where it was designed by Van. Since then, it has been one of the institute’s most popular courses.

“The exposure provided by the article printed in Claims magazine has literally sparked an interest in claims customer service that has not slowed down in three years,” Baumann said. “The only thing more exciting than having a class you think is terrific, is working with visionary people who help to make it better. We were impressed with Progressive’s dedication to their customers.”

Based on the institute’s popular “Awesome Claims Customer Service” class, a detailed leader’s guide was created by Schmitt, Van and Amy Ryan, Progressive’s senior instructional designer. After an initial beta test run, the institute held two “Train-the-Trainer” courses for 60 of Progressive’s claims trainers nationwide. From there, the program began to be rolled out to all claims employees throughout the country, with the institute’s assistance.

“If you ask claims adjusters to describe their jobs, you will usually get something along the lines of, ‘answer phones, discuss liability, write estimates, issue checks, etc.,’ ” Van said. “That is a pretty good list, but it points out a huge problem we have in our industry. Do we actually fix anyone’s house or car? Do we mend their wounds? Do we give them our car to drive? No, certainly not. We do arrange for these things to happen, however.

“Claims is a customer service business,” Van continued. “That’s what we do – actually that’s all we do. The problem we have is that the people who provide the customer service don’t know it. They think they’re in the ‘writing estimate’ business; or the ‘issuing checks’ business; or the ‘negotiating settlements’ business. They don’t know they’re in the customer service business. Because of that, there are tremendous customer service improvement opportunities that are simply going out the window.”

Playing the right roles

One philosophy stressed in the institute’s customer service class is that claims people need to recognize that losses can be upsetting and uncomfortable times for customers. In order to be truly successful, the claims people need to work together with customers through the claims process to resolve claims in the most efficient manner possible. This is focused upon in class through role-plays specific to the claims world.

“There is no point in teaching skills that take more time, since claims people already work hard and do not have time to spare,” Van said. “These techniques and concepts save them time, and immediately improve customer service, thereby resolving claims quicker and reducing costs.”

In one section, adjusters are taught how to explain the claims process to customers in a slightly different way, that increases the customer’s retention level from 20 percent to 60, even 70 percent. Attendees are also taught how to know immediately when a customer stops listening. Both of these are accomplished through the use of “nail down” questions (e.g. “Do you understand?” “Are you following?” etc.), which students are taught to use at proper intervals when explaining a lot of information, such as a description of the claim process.

Both these issues are centered on the idea that if customers are listening and remember what the adjuster says, it improves customer service and saves the adjuster time. Another section focuses on how to stop the “question cycle,” that seemingly endless string of questions that sometimes customers have when they are nervous and anxious. Students are taught how to:

• Gain credibility: “I understand for this claim to go smoothly is important to you.”
• Empathize: “You may be a little nervous, may even be a little anxious.”
• Reduce anxiety: “If you are, that’s okay. Lots of customers feel that way.”
• Gain credibility: “I know this is new to you, but this is my job. This is what I do.”
• Instill trust: “I just want to let you know I’ll do everything I can to make sure that the claim does go smoothly for you. Because I know it is important to you.”

Other sections involve with how to deal effectively with assertive or demanding claims customers, talkative claims customers and, of course, how to handle the angry claims customer.

Assertive or demanding customers, for instance, want information quickly and are prone to shorten the time frame on just about anything, unless their expectations are clearly set by the adjuster. How to do this is taught in class, and involves clearly identifying when and how events will take place. The talkative customer often continues to talk long after the meat of the conversation is over. Students are taught how to skillfully focus the talkative customer on the end of the conversation so as to maintain a high level of courtesy while ending the conversation.

Dealing with the angry caller successfully involves taking the correct steps to cool the customer down long enough to be helpful. Say a customer is upset that an appraiser missed his appointment. This means:

• Finding out what went wrong: “Can you tell me what happened?”
• Apologizing conditionally: “If we missed our appointment, I am sorry.”
• Refocusing the customer – letting the customer know we don’t always make this mistake: “We understand it is important to keep our appointments, and are usually very good at making them on time.”
• Gathering the facts: “Can you tell me when and where your appointment was?”
• Giving the customer an action plan: “Here’s what I’m going to do to help you.”

The key to the success here is the claims-specific scenarios and role-plays that really challenge the students to think about not just handling the issue, but how to resolve the issue and hold on to the person as a customer.

In perhaps the most dynamic and powerful sections, students are taught how to identify the not-so-obvious barriers to settling claims, and change things around just slightly to not only settle the claims, but to gain the customers’ agreement that they were treated fairly. This is accomplished through an advanced, high-level claims negotiation technique developed by International Insurance Institute.

Coming to a classroom near you

The course has had such a positive response at Progressive, that many more claims people have volunteered to help roll out the class, and another Train-the-Trainer course was scheduled for the first week in February 2000 in Tampa, Florida.

“Without question this is the most positive and influential class we have ever seen, said Dough Honaker, Progressive’s claims trainer for Louisiana and Mississippi. “Even claims adjusters with 10 to 15 years’ experience are commenting that it is the most useful and interesting class they have ever been to. We have seen immediate results of improved claims resolution and time savings by the claims folks.”

Bryan Passell, Progressive’s corporate claims process leader, said, “We can’t hit what we all hope to achieve in the next few years re-engineering the claims process without first taking a step back and better understanding what the customer wants from us. I believe that customer service and resolution do fit together perfectly, and that severity will go down, because the cycle time of the claim will shrink. And just as importantly, I believe our claims people will be better off living in a world with more satisfied customers.”

“This new way of thinking about customer service has immediately enhanced our ability to deal with customers,” added Samay Rehfeldt, Progressive’s claims trainer for Michigan. “It is not the same old tired ‘smile when you pick up the phone’ type of training. It is specific to claims, and right on target on how we sometimes forget we are here to help people.”

“Most of us in claims have been trained with one key element in mind: to settle claims,” Van said. “To accomplish this, we tend to beat a customer down with the facts, skillfully box them into a corner and point out they have no options, and basically torture them into submission. Then, when a customer finally can’t stand the pain anymore, and surrenders to us by simply giving up, we congratulate ourselves on being such great negotiators.”

“There is a much bigger ‘win’ for us, however, Van said. “Instead of just getting the customer to give in to us because they can’t take the pain anymore, [the key] is to guide the customer to the point where they agree with us in the first place. That, if done well, is the big win, because it improves our chances of holding onto that customer, and maybe even gaining new customers through referrals. And believe it or not, to do that actually takes less time and effort on the part of the claims staff.”

Paul Prochaska is owner of APS Webmasters, a Sacramento, California based company specializing in the design, development, and hosting of insurance-related web sites. Mr. Prochaska is webmaster of several insurance-related web sites.