The third edition of the Singapore FinTech Festival (SFF) attracted a record 45,000 participants from close to 130 countries and was graced by international and local dignitaries, including Narendra Modi, Prime Minister of India, Christine Lagarde, Managing Director, International Monetary Fund, and Ong Ye Kung, Minister for Education of Singapore and Board Member of the Monetary Authority of Singapore (MAS). Asia Advisers Network caught up with Jacky Chan, Regional Chief Executive, AIA Group, at the Festival.
“It is a really great event for industry players to share, learn, and collaborate,” said Jacky who was taking part in the SFF for the first time. The SFF is touted as the biggest FinTech event in the world and provides a global platform for the FinTech community to connect, collaborate and co-create.
AIA showcased its industry-leading digital services innovation at the Festival, including humanoid robot Pepper; the game-changing iResource platform which allows its insurance representatives to customise content to deeply engage and help customers; and POS EZ, the first-in-market innovation that enables its sales force to facilitate a suite of after-sales customer requests anytime anywhere, via its unique remote authentication capability.
A front-runner in Fintech
“AIA is a front-runner in Fintech and the digitalisation journey. Through state of the art technology that puts the customer at the centre of all we do, we strive to enhance customer experience, and customer engagement,” said Jacky who is responsible for AIA Group’s businesses operating in Hong Kong, Macau, Singapore, Brunei, Indonesia, the Philippines, and Cambodia as well as Group Agency Distribution.
AIA was the first insurer in Singapore to introduce humanoid robots and to elevate customer experience by incorporating artificial intelligence. When AIA opened its newly renovated customer service centre at Finlayson Green, it introduced new customer servicing colleagues globally-recognised Pepper and home-grown humanoid Nadine in collaboration with Singapore’s Nanyang Technological University.
Digital tools to enable agency
AIA Singapore was also one of the first insurance companies, to introduce digital tools to its agency and financial planners.
He said, “We believe that in Asia, life and health insurance are still predominantly sold through face-to-face advice. This is because life insurance is a long-term contract. It is a big commitment for our customers. Therefore, face-to-face interaction is still the key.”
Helping customers to live Healthier, Longer, Better Lives
AIA is also proud of introducing the game-changing AIA Vitality programme to the region. “It is a digitally-enabled tool which has really changed the insurance dialogue,” said Jacky.
“Instead of talking about ‘in case anything happens, we’ll pay the claims’, we encourage customers to live a healthier life and therefore help with prevention. By encouraging healthy living, customers will come to realise our mission of helping them live Healthier, Longer, Better Lives.”
More to come
Moving forward, he said: “You can expect a lot more from AIA in digitalisation because it is one of our key business strategies for the whole AIA group.”
Doubling down on its digitalisation journey, AIA will continue to provide superior customer experience to its customers, and introduce digital tools to help and enable its agents. “And these tools will continue to be upgraded and improved upon to give a seamless experience to our customers,” he said.
The Singapore FinTech Festival will return next year from 11 to 15 November 2019.
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