insurance telemarketing is accelerating its exit: 6 insurance companies have closed 9 telemarketing centers this year
2024-08-29
한어Русский языкEnglishFrançaisIndonesianSanskrit日本語DeutschPortuguêsΕλληνικάespañolItalianoSuomalainenLatina
our reporter su xianggao and trainee reporter yang xiaohan
recently, the regulatory authorities have successively agreed to cancel the shandong and hebei telephone sales centers of sino-british life insurance. according to incomplete statistics from the securities daily reporter, as of now, six insurance companies have been approved to cancel nine telephone sales centers this year, which is the same as the number of cancellations in the whole year of 2023.
experts interviewed said that insurance companies cancelled their telemarketing centers mainly due to factors such as the impact of other channels (internet channels, bank insurance channels, etc.), rising business development costs, and a large number of complaints affecting the company's reputation.
channel premium income is on a downward trend
since the beginning of this year, the regulatory authorities have successively agreed to the closure of telemarketing centers by many insurance companies. the regulatory authorities require that after the closure of the telemarketing center, it shall no longer conduct business in the name of the original institution, and notify the relevant policyholders, insured persons or beneficiaries to make proper arrangements for the payment of insurance premiums and the collection of insurance benefits.
according to incomplete statistics from the state financial supervision and administration bureau, as of now, six insurance companies have been approved to close nine telemarketing centers this year. specifically, those closed include china life's shandong and hebei telemarketing centers, china united life's chongqing no. 1 telemarketing center and guangzhou no. 2 telemarketing center, peking university founder life's shaanxi and qingdao branch telemarketing centers, as well as china taiping life's beijing telemarketing center, sunshine life's shijiazhuang telemarketing center, and taikang life's shandong weifang telemarketing center.
according to the reporter's statistics, since 2021, a total of 12 insurance companies have been approved to cancel a total of 35 telemarketing centers, and the highest number of telemarketing centers canceled by a single insurance company is 7. in terms of institutional type, the insurance companies that canceled their telemarketing centers are all life insurance companies, including leading insurance companies such as china life insurance and picc life insurance, as well as small and medium-sized insurance companies such as peking university founder life insurance, centennial life insurance, united life insurance, and china united metlife.
the premiums collected through telemarketing channels have been shrinking year by year. according to the "2021 life insurance telemarketing industry operation analysis report" released by the china insurance association, life insurance telemarketing premiums peaked at 21.36 billion yuan in 2018, and have since declined for three consecutive years. in 2021, the life insurance telemarketing industry achieved a total premium of 12.33 billion yuan, a decrease of 9.3% from 2020.
regarding the reasons why many insurance companies have cancelled their telemarketing centers, huang dazhi, a researcher at xingtu financial research institute, told the securities daily reporter that the telemarketing channel has been impacted by the internet channel, bank insurance channel, individual insurance channel and other channels; the cost of telemarketing is increasing, including labor costs, compliance costs, management costs, etc. in addition, customers and investors are generally disgusted with telephone sales, which has affected the operation of insurance companies.
zhou jin, a partner of pwc china's financial industry management consulting, also told the securities daily reporter that as my country's personal privacy protection and data security regulatory system continues to improve, many irregular customer acquisition methods and behaviors in the past telemarketing channels are difficult to sustain. the telemarketing model is highly dependent on human seats, resulting in high labor costs and management expenses, and frequent phone calls "disturb the public" will also trigger a large number of customer complaints, which will damage the company's public image and reputation. in addition, with the development of the internet and social networks, the way insurance companies reach customers and interact has changed, causing the coverage and efficiency of traditional telephone and sms channels to continue to decline. these factors have weakened the enthusiasm of insurance companies to promote the development of telemarketing business.
multi-channel collaboration is the future direction
with the development of the insurance industry and the rise of the internet, more and more consumers tend to buy insurance through online channels. the "2023 china internet insurance consumer insight report" jointly released by the china insurance and pension research center of tsinghua university pbc school of finance and yuanbao group shows that compared with 2022, the online insurance purchase rate of consumers of all ages in 2023 will generally increase, and the offline insurance purchase rate will decrease. the higher the consumer's income, the higher the education level, and the higher the city level, the more inclined they are to buy insurance online.
huang dazhi said that the internet channel has a tendency to replace the telemarketing channel, but this does not mean that the telemarketing channel will completely withdraw from the market. relatively speaking, as a channel that reaches the widest range of people, the internet channel has lower customer acquisition costs and is more convenient. however, for groups such as middle-aged and elderly customers who do not often go online, the telemarketing channel is still a relatively important channel. in addition, compared with the internet channel, the telemarketing channel can provide more detailed and direct services, respond to customer needs faster, and can deliver valuable information more quickly to policyholders who are not familiar with the internet channel. for some relatively complex products, the telemarketing channel may be more suitable than the internet channel.
zhou jin said that with the rise of mobile internet and social networks, the social network model based on interaction and ecology has become an effective way to acquire customers and conduct marketing. therefore, many companies have shifted their development focus to emerging channels such as internet channels, and integrated traditional telemarketing into them as a supplement to emerging channels.
looking to the future, zhou jin said that different channels are expected to gradually merge and work together to serve customer needs.
source: securities daily
