Majority of two-wheeler insurance bought online for reviving lapsed policies

Did you know that six out of ten Indians buying two-wheeler insurance online in 2018 were using the digital platform to revive lapsed policies? These are the findings of the Policybazaar.com's Product and Innovation Centre (PIC) latest study taking into account the behaviour of almost 10 lakh plus consumers purchasing two-wheeler insurance online across the nation.

For a country where almost 75 percent of the two-wheelers are uninsured, the digital platform has started to emerge as a preferred platform for the world's largest selling two-wheeler market. The survey further revealed that majority of these consumers would have not revived their insurance for two-wheelers in the near future, if not for the digital platform offering ease, convenience and instant issuance.

What makes the findings unique are that this is the largest ever studies run on this big a consumer pool that owns two-wheeler in their household. The analysis of the data clearly shows that digital channel has started to make roads safer and more secured, as accidents are an every-day phenomenon in India.

The risk of uninsured two-wheelers plying on the roads stems from the accidental liability that kicks in on the people and their families involved in the case of a mishap, which most times leads to death and disability of bread earners in the families.

"These are wonderful results, as it has a larger social impact on the well-being of the society where two-wheeler is the primary vehicle of transport. Two-wheeler insurance has been a riddle for insurers for long, as distributors have never shown interest due to the small-ticket size. It's a tailor-made product for the digital channel, as its strength lies in keeping the cost of acquisition extremely low," said Yashish Dahiya, Co-founder and CEO, Policybazaar.com group of companies.

"We see this category becoming digital-exclusive in the times to come, as more awareness and word of mouth spreads. Media has a great social responsibility here in making this category sustainable for insurers and the digital platform providers, given the margins are extremely low," Dahiya further commented.

A further analysis of the study, in fact, throws even more interesting inferences, such as mere one-third of Indians with lapsed two-wheeler coverage bought a new cover within 90 days of the expiry of the previous policy. Whereas, two-thirds of Indians revived their two-wheeler insurance post 90 days of the expiry of their previous policy.

Also, a whopping 86 percent of the surveyed opted for a blanket comprehensive cover in 2018 vis-a-vis 75 percent consumers in 2017. This is again a positive sign for the Indian roads, as the third-party only cover is the minimum pre-requisite by law for plying two-wheelers on the road.

Post the new regulation brought by IRDAI in accordance with Supreme Court order beginning Sep 2018 the third party cover is now mandatory for at least 5 yrs for new bikes. One would have assumed that this might bring down the customers impressions on the digital platform since it simply means a steep increase in the insurance premium for the two-wheeler customers. On the contrary, the transparency of the product and ease of digital platform has brought in more customers after Sep 2018 resulting in an increase by 30 percent of insurance policies being sold only for new two-wheelers.