ANZ, New Zealand’s biggest bank, has joined forces with Suncorp NZ and tech powerhouse IBM to develop a ‘first of its kind’ blockchain solution for New Zealand insurers.
 

The DLT-backed solution is expected to drastically increase the speed and transparency of data transfers and payment reconciliation between brokers and insurers, according to IBM.

“Reconciling policy information and premium payments made by a broker to an insurer on behalf of customers is a slow and painful process,” said Paul Goodwin, ANZ Managing Director Institutional NZ.

“The blockchain solution will be much more efficient for the industry as well as being very secure. As a ‘single source of truth’, it will provide greater visibility throughout the process, remove uncertainty and help make response times faster.

“This technology will work with existing industry solutions to capture relevant information; ensuring payments can be forecast and made without the need for reconciliation.”

IBM New Zealand managing director Mike Smith said the interoperable network will “not only decrease policy costs and improve customer service, but also build a foundation for the introduction of other transformative technologies, such as artificial intelligence.”

In a corresponding white paper, ANZ said the blockchain solution will also be integrated with an automated payment process, which will not only serve to simplify bulk payments, but also make them immutable and trackable via the ledger.