Claims Business: CompScience, EagleView, Schaefer City and GGA

CompScience Insurance Services has entered into a managing general agent agreement with Nationwide and Swiss Re to underwrite, bind and service workers’ compensation policies.

CompScience, a San Francisco technology company, says its Intelligent Safety Platform reduces claims through actuarial analysis. The product detects previously underreported workplace risks by analyzing existing workplace videos to spot behavioral and environmental hazards.

“Nationwide looked at two years of actuarial data and saw that the technology shows promise, we found that the CompScience computer vision models, data science, and reporting tools could help potentially save lives and reduce costs,” John Lopes, senior vice president of Nationwide Product Expansion, said in a press release.

CompScience says its predictive risk models allow customers to benchmark their workplaces against other businesses, monitor trends and quantify the value of risk mitigating technology.

Josh Butler, chief executive officer of CompScience, told A.M. Best that its risk assessment program looks for immediate and long-term issues that could generate claims. He said instead of scheduling safety inspections, when employees may be told to exhibit best safety practices, the company requests recently recorded video from multiple camera views taken during varying times and days of operation, A.M. Best reported.

Two Southern California attorneys, who founded an insurance defense firm that markets itself as a specialist in avoiding nuclear verdicts, have launched an insurtech that sells software to help insurance carriers identify claims that have the potential to “go nuclear.”

Schaefer City Technologies said in a press release that it has a patent pending on its software product, called NaVel, uses predictive analytics that embeds with existing insurance software to determine the likelihood that a claim will result in a verdict of more than $10 million. The company said its program uses data points from thousands of cases that resulted in nuclear verdicts.

Robert Tyson Jr. and Patrick J. Mendes are among Schaefer City’s founders. The two attorneys are both partners with the Tyson & Mendes law firm in San Diego. Tyson’s sister, Denise M. Tyson, is chief executive officer of the firm.

“The No. 1 question we’ve received from thousands of insurance professionals in the last three years is, ‘How do I spot a nuclear verdicton my desk before it happens?'” Tyson said in a press release. “With Schaefer City Tech, we have developed the early-warning system to help insurance companies save billions of dollars.”

The company said its proprietary algorithm was developed in partnership with Villanova University School of Business and Professor Nathan Coates, who focuses on data analytics and the application of machine learning to business problems.

EagleView, which provides aerial imagery to property insurers, has teamed up with a home inspectiion company founded by television personality Mike Holmes to assess roof damage.

Mike Holmes Inspections will use EagleView Access to improve the qualityand efficiency of roof inspections for property insurance claims, EagleViewsaid in a press release. The company has a network of roof inspectors throughout Canada who are trained and equipped with EagleView drones, the company said.

“My team was impressed with how easy it was for an inspector to fly the EagleView drone and the quality of the imagery provided,” Holmes, said in a prepared statement. “And the autonomous flight capabilities ensure a consistent and efficient roof inspection every time.”

Holmes is a Canadian contractor best known as host of the Holmes on Homes television show, where he rescues desperate homeowners from botched renovation projects with a promise to “make it right.”

GGA Solutions, a “near shore” business process outsourcing company that operates in the United States and Mexico, has launched a claims services division.

“The new arm of the company, GGA Claims Services, is equipped to face a silent but concerning phenomena in the insurance industry: 25% of claims adjusters have retired or are about to retire,” the company said in a press release. “The claims adjuster population is aging and recent college graduates are gravitating to the tech industry.”

GGA said it specializes in providing multilingual customer service specialists. Its new claims division will offer help with tasks ranging from first notice of loss to end-to-end claims handling, the company said.

The company said it employs “college-educated” claim representatives who work out of the Dallas-Fort Worth metropolitan area and in Puebla, Mexico.