Summary
Aditya Birla Health Insurance- Digital self-service (Chatbot) growth story: Aditya Birla Health Insurance's WhatsApp chatbot, launched in 2021, exceeded expectations with remarkable digital self-service growth. Meeting customer demands on their preferred engagement channel, we delivered precisely what they needed from one step download of the policy kit to raising a claim and much more. We received an unprecedented response to Ayushman Bharat Health Account (ABHA) ID creation on our platforms.
Challenge
We had a few challenges that we attempted to address via customer service chatbot: 1. Enormous calls at the contact center 2. Accessibility issue during non working hours 3. No DIY option to avail services 4. Human errors while operating with large volumes of requests 5. Higher operational cost
Objective
The main objective to develop the interactive NLP based AI/ML led chatbot on WhatsApp, website and App was to enable customers with the DIY journeys to cater the service needs. We aim to serve at least 80% of our customers digitally (pre-dominantly via chatbot). Additionally, to reduce the human intervention to address the service requests and allow the user to avail the service 24/7. Also, we use the chatbot as an engagement medium to promote the Activ health app features and to engage to users to keep them motivated in their health and wellness journey.
Strategy
Back in 2020-21, our call volume surged drastically which affected the overall cost of manpower, infrastructure and technology. We bucketed the service requests into mainly 5 categories that consisted more than 70% of the volume and addressed the same via chatbot. Additionally, we aimed at connecting with our clients on WhatsApp via campaigns and notifications to convey the next step of actions expected from them. This mainly includes the How to guides, short videos to explain processes, list of available services, updates on their ActivDayz, Health Returns, renewal due etc. Moreover, we noticed ample requests for endorsement in the initial 2 weeks of policy purchase. To handle this proactively on digital platform, we initiated an endorsement campaign where we advice the users to cross-verify their policy details and edit them if required. This got us great response. Another strategy we used to increase digital adoption of claims and service requests is to implement the Optical character recognition (OCR) functionality. It aided users to upload the valid documents in the right bucket without human intervention. Multilingual BOT to address customer in Hindi language – all efficiently managed through our chatbot.
Data
From the CRM entries of service requests, we grouped the requests into 2 categories: 1. Most demanded services 2. Interlinked services that can be combined to address the problem statement One of the initiatives we took was to deliver the policy copy on WhatsApp as soon as the customer's profile is created on our system. This was driven by our CRM data where the maximum number of calls were recorded for the reason- 'Unavailability of policy kit'. Additionally, we give a link to track the application status so that the customers know the exact status of their policy issuance.
Solution
Unlocked the real magic: Addressed customers' needs seamlessly on WhatsApp- the most preferred channel of communication! Swift and easy claim processing with Optical character recognition (OCR) functionality to upload claims documents seamlessly. In our campaign- 'Jump for health', we invited people to jump for their health and took this initiative a notch ahead by pledging to donate 1 prosthetic leg to the needy for every 10,000 jumps that we would collect.
Results
We started digital self-servicing options in 2019 on our website and mobile app which picked up noticeably after the introduction of chatbot in mid 2021. Here is the insight: Financial year % Digital self-service We support the 'health first' model in the form of Active Dayz which has achieved 11.5Bn steps per month. It helped us increase the adoption and engagement ratio of our Activ Health app. 2020 19 2021 41 2022 65 2023 75 2024 (Till Nov 23) 81 In 2022, we collected 8.95 million jumps and donated 895 prosthetic legs to the needy. A big achievement was also that we touched a historic milestone with a Guinness World RecordsTM title for the ‘largest online video album of people jumping in the air' with 5455 Jump For Health videos shortlisted from over 9000 videos that we received.
