HSG Provides Natural Disaster Risk Management to Insurance Industry

In the wake of multiple catastrophic events in the United States, HSG developed a comprehensive risk management system to assist insurance partners during natural disasters. This system was put to the test in assisting First Premium and Louisiana Citizens Insurance when dealing with Hurricane Isaac.

“We manage day-to-day claims activities for Louisiana Citizens Insurance, but we needed a business partner that could rapidly scale up and help us when the next “big one” hit, “ said Joby Najolia of First Premium Insurance.

HSG, along with input from First Premium Insurance and Louisiana Citizens Property Insurance Corp., identified key elements in managing claims resulting from a natural disaster. These elements include creating a model for claims volume, sharing management capabilities, combining technology, and creating custom FNOL input scripts and screens. The team also put together a very specific action plan built around lead-time models.

The implementation of these risk management elements proved successful during Hurricane Isaac, which caused severe destruction to the northern Gulf Coast in August.

“I attribute our success in managing Hurricane Isaac to collaborative effort, communication and shared resources,” said Paul Gross, HSG president and CEO. “As a result, we delivered great service in extraordinarily difficult operating environments.”

When Hurricane Isaac came ashore in Louisiana, the area lost power and internet connectivity. First Premium’s call traffic was seamlessly routed to HSG’s 24/7/365 command center in Eau Claire, Wisc., where policyholders were greeted with a live human voice within an average of less than 20 seconds.

Louisiana Citizens recently reported that 85 percent of 17,059 claims have been settled from damage caused by Hurricane Isaac by mid-October, the quickest turnaround rate in its history. “We maintained 100 percent of our service level targets that were part of the plan,” said David Stagner, HSG executive VP of Sales.

Source: HSG