Italy’s Insurers Association Trials Blockchain for Alternative Dispute Resolution

The Italian association of insurance companies is trialing blockchain for disputes with car-liability claims before the litigation phase. The association is collaborating with several other entities on the project.

Italy’s National Association of Insurance Companies (ANIA) is conducting a blockchain trial in the insurance sector, according to a press release. The organization aims to leverage the technology in disputes with car-liability claims during pre-litigation. ANIA is collaborating for the project with Reply, Milan-based CeTIF (Research Centre on Technology, Innovation, and Financial Services), which is part of the Catholic University of the Sacred Heart, and IVASS (Institute for Insurance Supervision).

The trial revolves around an Alternative Dispute Resolution (ADR) service, which allows insurance firms and customers to resolve disputes between each other outside the courtroom. The project will benefit from being part of the Insurance Blockchain Sandbox, a supervised virtual framework aimed at trialing innovative technologies and unique use cases with the participation of insurance companies, customers, and various other relevant entities.

The development of the project under the Sandbox is managed and tracked by a Scientific Committee that comprises representatives of ANIA, IVASS, CeTIF, Reply, and other entities involved in the trial. The parties are expecting clear benefits driven by the blockchain technology, which might lead to an eventual blockchain adoption to a larger scale.

ANIA President Maria Bianca Farina commented on the project:

“Thanks to this initiative we intend to experiment in a concrete and effective manner with the potential offered by the Blockchain technology, applying it to a first use case highly beneficial to our sector. This will allow us to implement and take advantage of the benefits identified during the experiment to facilitate the operation of all the companies.”

The ADR experiment has several phases, which include the exchange of the amounts sent to the platform by counterparties with the goal of resolving a legal dispute. The process is done via an auction method that considers several factors determined for the trial, agreed upon by the customer/legal representative, and backed by a blockchain-based smart contract.

Besides the mentioned organizations, the experiment also involves other insurance companies like Axa, Helvetia, Cattolica, Cargeas-Cardif, Sara, and Zurich.

Blockchain, also called distributed ledger technology (DLT), is preferred in the insurance sector due to its capability to ensure transparency and security of transactions and negotiations. On Wednesday, we reported that the American Association of Insurance Services (AAIS) would leverage IBM’s blockchain technology to improve insurance regulatory data reporting processes.