How we protect insurance contact centres
Professional fraudsters will abuse any vulnerabilities they find to defraud insurance companies for financial gain – and for many, that means targeting the contact centre.
Insurance fraud can be hard to spot
Typical types of insurance fraud can be tricky to spot using standard online checks. But often fraudsters will exploit the relative vulnerability of the contact centre, and when they do, there are certain traits that can help identify them:
- Calls from the same number to apply for multiple similar policies, across multiple providers
- Multiple calls to make mid term changes to policies, such as address changes or adding additional drivers to motor polices
- Calls from the same number to make multiple claims, across multiple accounts and policies – also across multiple providers
- Calls from denylist numbers flagged internally or by other organisations, including banks or telcos
- Attempts to avoid detection by calling using a withheld phone number
With the right technology in place, it is possible to spot these patterns and flag callers displaying these traits in the contact centre and stop fraud in its tracks.
Delivering value for insurance companies
Just how bad is it?
One leading insurance company knew they had some fraud in the contact centre. They just didn’t know how big the problem was, so Smartnumbers helped them evaluate it.
The company started with a small project to monitor incoming calls for motor insurance polices over a period of 10 weeks.
The result
- Fraud found spanned four different kinds: ghost-broking; applications fraud; identity fraud; claims fraud
- Previously unknown fraud was uncovered and new fraudsters discovered
- Calls received from fraudsters who are known by large retail banks using the platform
The results of the project provided the catalyst needed for a much bigger fraud prevention approach in the contact centre that would enable intelligence sharing and collaboration across companies and sectors.
