Survey: U.S. insurers surpass rest of world in customer satisfaction

By network or channel, life insurance agents consistently garner the high positive customer experience ratings across regions. More than half of customers in North America (56 percent) express satisfaction with their agent. This compares with 41 percent, 37 percent, 44 percent, 45 percent and 40 percent, respectively, who say they have a positive experience using the broker, bank, phone, Internet/PC and Internet/mobile channels.

When asked about factors influencing their decision to choose or leave a life insurer, most respondents cite a company’s price or rate. More than half (51 percent) say this is factor to choose an insurer and 45 percent cite it as a reason to leave.

Other factors that also rank high among respondents are product features (38 percent/choose vs. 38 percent/leave), brand trust (41 percent vs. 32 percent), after-sales service (41 percent vs. 35 percent) and quality of advice (39 percent vs. 33 percent).

When asked to rate the importance of certain initiative in implementing a successful integrated multi-distribution model, creating mobile channel capabilities rank highest among the survey respondents: These capabilities receive an average score of 4.9 on a scale of one to seven (one being “not important” and seven being “very important).

Other initiatives that respondents accord high priority are “centralize intelligence” (4.9 score), “channel integration (4.4), cross-network cooperation (4.3), and leverage social media (4.1)