Soon, a toll-free number to register all insurance complaints

Insurance policyholders may soon get a new service to register their complaints over a call to through the Integrated Grievance Call Centre (ICGC). Karvy Data Management Services will handle the IRDAI IGCC for five years.

IGCC aims to facilitate communication between the insured public, insurers and IRDAI to improve the working of the grievance redressal mechanism. No other financial services industry has a single call centre to register all kinds of complaints.

Insurance Regulatory and Development Authority of India (IRDAI) has established Consumer Affairs Department to oversee compliance of insurers with respect to Protection of Policyholders’ Interests Regulations and also to empower consumers by educating them on Grievance redressal mechanisms.

IGCC would be managed with a toll-free number giving a cost-effective option to empower consumers by educating them and providing all basic assistance concerning registration of grievances.

It is envisaged that the IGCC would not only attend to phone calls, e-mails but also complaints forwarded by Consumer Affairs Department (CAD) of the authority, subject to internal procedures, complaint registration process and other process requirements.

IGCC would examine and act on complaints received over phone and e-mails at the first level and the letters forwarded by the CAD, IRDAI and then escalate them to the respective insurer.

This aims to be a comprehensive tele-functionalities (both manual and IVR) to all insurance consumer segments, serving as a 12 hours/6 days (8am-8pm) service platform, offering multiple languages and integrating channels.

Under this system, Karvy Data Management Services has to ensure a minimum of 99 percent of end-to-end uptime (calculated on a monthly basis) for the smooth functioning of all the activities and shall agree for suitable penalty clauses in case of failure to provide the required uptime.

Currently, individuals file complaints with the respective insurers which are recorded by the Integrated Grievance Management System (IGMS). All details of the grievance including type and time taken to resolve it is captured in IGMS. With IGCC, all data could be routed through the call centres to each insurer.