The pandemic has forced the industry to hasten its embrace of automation. By the start of this year, over 40% of life insurers had either already incorporated some degree of accelerated and automated underwriting into their new business process, or had imminent plans to do so. This was a dramatic increase from 18% the year before – according to research from Celent.

Pandemic or not, this pivot was always inevitable, and the numbers underline why. According to Celent, over half of insurers that have already adopted accelerated underwriting report payback periods of less than a year, with another quarter either reporting or expecting payback in just two to three years.