Digital Onboarding for Insurers: Faster Policies, AML-Ready
Digital Onboarding for Insurers: Faster Policies with Maximum Fraud Protection
Speed and security in customer acquisition are key competitive factors in today’s insurance market. Traditional identification processes, built around in-person visits and paper documentation, are slow and costly, whether for car insurance, travel insurance, or life insurance.
Digital onboarding turns identification into an automated, regulation-ready process. By implementing biometrics, NFC verification and automated KYC/KYB checks, insurers gain operational efficiency and a better customer experience. This approach lets insurers streamline operations, build customer trust and reduce operational risk.
Customer identification methods
LiveID (video identification)
Identification happens via a real-time video call with an agent. It suits more complex policies that need direct communication and extra verification, with the advantage that every policy detail can be agreed on and signed by the end of the same call.
Example: arranging life insurance with high coverage amounts, home insurance, or a pension-fund transfer.
SelfID (automated biometrics)
Enables 24/7 onboarding with no human involvement. The customer scans an ID document and records a short video of their face; an AI system then matches the face to the document and runs a liveness check. The whole process takes a few seconds.
Example: fast identity verification for lower-risk policies, such as travel insurance or supplementary health insurance.
NFCID
Uses the personal data stored on the chip found in most recent passports and ID cards. A smartphone with built-in NFC can read this data and cross-check it against information gathered through other identification methods.
Example: when registering a new customer, they simply tap their phone against their ID card. The system automatically pulls the national ID number, date of birth and address from the chip, saving the customer time.
WalletID (EUDI Wallet)
A digital wallet built on EU standards (the EUDI Wallet) lets customers share personal data, digital identity, driving licence or diploma, with service providers while keeping full control over access to their own data.
Example: when filing a car insurance claim, the customer shares driving licence and vehicle ownership data directly through the digital wallet, without emailing copies of documents.
Read more: [EUDI Wallet: The Digital Identity Revolution – Are You Ready for 2027?]
Compliance and risk assessment
Screening systems: sanctions and PEP screening
This process automatically checks customers against up-to-date global databases to identify individuals or entities under international restrictions, or politically exposed persons (PEPs).
- Sanctions screening: insurers are legally required to refuse services to individuals or legal entities under international restrictions.
- PEP screening: identifying people in in high public positions (officials, judges, state-company executives) who, due to their influence, require enhanced due diligence.
KYC/KYB (Know Your Customer / Know Your Business)
This process covers additional checks on clients or corporate entitites, ensuring compliance with AML rules and the transparency and legitimacy of transactions.
- KYC (Know Your Customer): detailed identification of individuals, including risk-profile analysis, the purpose of the policy, and verification of the source of funds.
- KYB (Know Your Business): in-depth analysis of legal entities to establish the ultimate beneficial owner (UBO) and the specifics of their business.
What insurers gain?
By introducing advanced onboarding systems, insurers transform their business in several ways:
- Lower operating costs: digital processes eliminate manual data entry and paper documentation, freeing up resources for direct sales.
- Fraud prevention: Advanced biometrics and NFC verification further complicate impersonation attempts and reduce the risk of identity fraud
- Full compliance: automated AML compliance reduces the risk of regulatory penalties.
- Scalability: flexible resource allocation adapts dynamically to demand and handles large volumes of new customers at once.
- A complete audit trail: the system provides everything needed for regulatory review.
Key benefits
| Benefit | Description |
| Speed-to-market | A policy can be issued in under 5 minutes, from first click to digital signature. |
| Customer experience | Simply remote contracting process can contribute to reducing customer churn |
| Data accuracy | Encrypted data is pulled directly from documents (NFC/OCR). |
| 24/7 availability | SelfID lets customers get insured at any time. |
The numbers behind it
According to a McKinsey report on AI in insurance (July 2026), insurers that applied AI across core business areas, sales, underwriting, claims handling and policy servicing, recorded:
- a 10–20% improvement in sales conversion and new-agent success rates,
- a 10–15% increase in premium growth,
- a 20–40% reduction in customer onboarding costs,
- a 3–5% improvement in claims-processing accuracy.
The report covers AI adoption across insurance operations broadly, not digital onboarding specifically, but the onboarding cost reduction directly supports the business case for these systems.
Why choose this now?
- Customer expectations: in 2026, customers expect instant, 24/7 service. If the process takes more than a few clicks, they will drop off and go to a competitor.
- Security: per Gartner, by the end of 2026 as much as 30% of enterprises will no longer consider face-biometric verification reliable when used in isolation, due to increasingly sophisticated deepfake attacks. The recommended approach is to combine biometrics with additional signals, such as behavioural analysis and device checks, rather than relying on a single method.
- Regulatory protection: the new EU AML package (AMLR, AMLA, AMLD6) introduces a single rulebook across the Union and recognises the EUDI Wallet as a valid identification method for KYC and AML onboarding. According to analysis by EY, financial institutions and other obliged entities will need to be able to accept the EUDI Wallet for onboarding by 2027.
For more on upcoming EU regulatory changes, see: EY, How to prepare your CDD and onboarding for the EU AML overhaul
Turn administrative friction into a competitive edge
Turn administrative friction into your strongest sales advantage by implementing a single digital onboarding process that thoroughly verifies customer identity in an instant. Future-proof your business with maximum fraud protection and give customers the fastest path to your services.
Contact us to digitalise your business together and take the customer experience to the next level. [Contact our experts
Author: Sara Sever
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