In another first innovation in the Cayman Islands insurance market, local insurer Saxon has employed the use of drones for data gathering, imaging and surveying purposes of residential properties that the company insures.

The drone is deployed to locate a specific residential property via GPS to capture external images of the property and surrounding areas. It automatically calculates the structural dimensions of the  building and produces 3D images, which, according to Saxon CEO Brian Williams, enables the insurance underwriter to have “a visual understanding of the property and the risks associated with it.” The images are then stored in a database as part of the client file.

Mr. Williams notes that use of drone technology is ideal for speeding up the claims process and eliminates the need for contracting a loss adjuster in some circumstances. In the event of a natural disaster such as a hurricane, loss adjusters are usually flown into the island to undertake physical inspection of damaged properties and this process could take weeks.

“For each insured property, we will have on hand images taken for the purposes of valuation at the time of underwriting. Once a disaster hits, we would deploy the drone to take new images of the property, so immediately we would have a set of before-and-after pictures that would allow us to do a preliminary assessment of the damage,” Mr. Williams stated.

“We estimate that this technology will help us to reduce the claim settlement timeframe by at least 50 percent,” he added.

Saxon’s efforts to introduce drone technology has been lauded by leading international reinsurance and insurance group, Everest Re, which reinsures the company’s commercial property portfolio.

“It is great to see Saxon embracing cutting-edge technology and  continuing to take measures to improve the manner in which the insurance industry does business,” noted Ron Diaz, Senior Vice President.

Several countries including the UK and USA are using drone technology commercially by governments and private sector enterprises for varying applications including news and data gathering, delivery services, maintenance and even for medical care. Saxon is the only insurance company in the Caribbean to employ the technology for the underwriting and claims process.

“We continue to take steps to improve our services to clients, particularly  through the use of cutting-edge technology. We were first to the Cayman market with other innovations such as our Buy Online Insurance and we look forward to doing even more to make the business of insurance even more hassle-free for customers,” Mr. Williams stated.