Insurance is still a very touchy topic in Nigeria, and this is evidenced in the fact that Nigeria is yet to even attain a 3% insurance penetration, despite all the players in the space – both big and small. Cultural and religious beliefs also pose a huge challenge as some people associate insurance with planning for evil occurrences, and so refuse it outrightly.
Many of the players have been focused on servicing the formal sector of the labour force, while trying repeatedly to break into the informal sector. In the midst of all of this, Mizala stepped into the insurance scene with a different kind of insurance experience.
Mizala offers simpler, easier and flexible insurance packages and subscriptions that is tailored to cater to the informal and formal sector. It offers ease of use, so that new customers can sign up from their mobile phones and have an active insurance plan covering their vehicles, within 5 minutes.
Israel Ifedayo, Chief Operations Officer, at Mizala explained during the Nairametrics Business Half Hour that Mizala was created to provide the first layer of financial security for its users, through its insurance packages. The word ‘Mizala’ is an Arabic word that means umbrella, and the idea is that if you are preparing for a rainy day, you need an umbrella – Mizala.
“We all save for some reason. When you save, you are saving for the rainy day or towards something. We have budgets for all these random things that might happen to us, and we save towards those things. What Mizala is saying is when you insure your property, you have done the best kind of saving, because you really don’t have to save as much, and whenever you run into an incident, you would have the full amount you need to solve whatever problem it is, because come to think of it, how much can you realistically save for a car theft?” Ifedayo explained.
Purchase insurance in 5 minutes
The road to getting an insurance policy cover just got shorter with Mizala. As against the era of visiting physical offices and filling out long papers and documents, one can easily purchase an insurance policy on the Mizala website within minutes.
Immediately after signing up, filling in basic details and making payment, you receive a pending policy certificate in your email, only getting the original after the inspection process has been completed. The digital inspection process also covers this end so that it can all be done virtually with the customer taking real-time picture and videos of the vehicle.
“We have made it possible for people to get insurance faster and with ease, so, you can literally purchase insurance within 5 minutes. We have also reduced the claims process from the average 14-28 days to less than 48 hours. The digital inspection process automates all of that and makes it easier and faster. We believe insurance is the first layer of financial security and what we have done is make the process simpler, faster and very flexible.”
What Mizala offers, that others don’t
The government mandates every vehicle owner to have a third party insurance to protect other road users. This means that in the event of an accident, the insurance covers the third party. In addition to this, Mizala is offering a flexible, comprehensive insurance policy that covers the car, passengers in the car, and any third party in the event of a mishap. In the event of theft, burglary, or accidents, the insurance provides a cover for everyone in the vehicle at the time of the mishap, as well as the third party involved. In addition, policyholders get a free car tracker when they purchase an insurance product from Mizala.
There is also the added feature where policyholders can opt for a weekly, monthly or annual payment plan depending on income and convenience. For those who work in the informal sector and earn on a weekly or daily basis, this insurance product gives them the much sought after ease – a kind of pay-as-you-go option where one can pay weekly and at convenience.
“They are designed for the informal sector, perhaps those who earn money daily or weekly and feel that they cannot afford a monthly or annual plan. So they can get on the weekly plan and pay weekly, and any week, they do not pay, the insurance is not active for that week. But whenever they resume payment, it becomes active again.
Accessing claims within 48 hours
Whereas traditional insurance allows policyholders to make and access their claims within 14 to 28 days, Mizala has a process that compresses the time to less than 48 hours. Without visiting any physical office, a customer can simply go to the website on his phone and initiate the process of policy claims, and carry out another digital inspection.
“More than anything else, we understand that insurance is a trust and service business. When you subscribe to insurance, you are spending that money because you trust that when you have a problem, they will come through for you. That is why we are focusing on building trust with our policyholders. In most cases, Nigerians have shown us that either physically or remotely, as long as you don’t renege on the quality of your service, they would always come through for you. Our fraudulent claims pattern so far shows less than 0.5% so far and it has been really amazing,” Ifedayo noted.
The digital inspection process allows Mizala capture the needed data immediately, and the artificial intelligence and machine learning programs process these claims and look out for any fraudulent pattern. Once it scales through this stage, the policyholder gets his claims within 48 hours. So despite having a physical office in Ikeja, Lagos, practically every step is handled virtually.
Educating the consumers
Due to existing customer predispositions and the tendency to refuse insurance, Mizala has to invest a lot into customer education to teach them the importance of insurance, and show them that it is really not as opaque and difficult as it used to be in the past.
“In the next two weeks, we will be launching a Youtube animated series focused on teaching people about insurance primarily, what it does, how it benefits them and why they need to have insurance,” Ifedayo said.
Over the next 5 years, Mizala wants to drive insurance penetration in Nigeria up to at least 5%, with more insurance products across e-commerce products in transit, health and life.
I can’t Contact mizala