Brit Uses Aerial Imagery to Expedite Hurricane Ian Claims Payments

Brit Ltd (“Brit”) has successfully issued claims payments directly to Insureds within days of Hurricane Ian. Using a proprietary machine learning algorithm in tandem with ultra-high-resolution aerial imagery to accelerate the accurate identification of US property damage, Brit has been able to “virtually adjust” and approve claims payments directly from its offices in London.

Using this technology, Brit was able to make its earliest claim payment in response to Hurricane Ian on 8 October 2022.  This represents a lifecycle of natural catastrophe impact to payment to settlement of approximately one week, against a backdrop of challenges for traditional adjusters to gain immediate on-the-ground access due to flooding and emergency conditions.

Sheel Sawhney, Group Head of Claims and Operations at Brit, said: “This shows that virtual claims adjusting in real-time is a reality for the London market. By bringing together the industry’s premier geo-spatial imagery, our own machine learning capabilities and market-leading payment technology we have been able to make payments to our customers only a week after Hurricane Ian made landfall in Florida.”

Brit has been working successfully with the Geospatial Insurance Consortium (GIC) since April 2019. GIC is a non-profit organisation that captures best in class post-event aerial imagery for first responders and insurance companies. Utilising the GIC images and Brit’s machine learning algorithm, Brit’s Claims team has a virtual claim adjusting platform that can expedite claims payments in locations that cannot be immediately serviced by local field adjusters in the initial days following catastrophe events.

Mike Barry, Head of Global Property Claims for Brit, commented, “At Brit, we continue to advance the way we manage claims and are committed to paying our end clients faster. This includes investment and innovation in virtual claims adjusting as well as a complete transformation of our loss funding and payments technology. Catastrophes are a high urgency, high visibility event for the market and our focus is always on helping the dislocated families and businesses that are impacted.”

Brit is also actively pursuing Hurricane Ian claims payments that would utilise the Future of Lloyd’s faster claims payments service (FCP). FCP is a transformative solution to allow delegated claims administrators to make payments on request, drawing down on Lloyd’s managing agents funds directly.