Unmanned Aircraft Systems (UAS) or Drones are more and more being called into the insurance industry to natural and manmade disasters to evaluate the impact area, inspect assets, manage risk, and evaluate claims efficiently, accurately and most of all safely.
Drone deployment is rapidly expanding and evolving, with current and potential applications spanning the insurance value chain. For example:
Pre-loss
Risk engineering and pricing—Aerial site assessments can identify property features that allow the owner either to seek a reduced risk profile or to take appropriate actions to lower overall risk and justify premium discounts.
Natural disaster monitoring—Drones can be quickly and safely deployed to monitor areas threatened by natural disasters. Governments working with insurance companies can monitor a situation and alert local residents to potential danger.
Post-loss
Inspection—Drones can provide a safer, faster, and more cost-effective way to conduct a site inspection, particularly in challenging working conditions.
Risk assessment—Drones may allow insurers to engage a generalist, rather than a specialist, to perform field assessments and obtain high-quality visuals.
Claims adjudication—The precise photos that drones take can potentially improve the quality of the claims adjudication process.
Fraud prevention—The moment a property claim is reported (First Notice of Loss), a drone could be deployed to inspect the claims site, increasing information capture accuracy and timeliness.
With such diverse and practical applications, it’s no wonder that some insurance industry leaders are eager to implement drone programs. In order to get the program up and running quickly, some are opting to buy commercial-off-the-shelf drones to do important tasks they are often not suited for. More importantly, many often overlook the most important component in a drone operation, a well-trained pilot.
Members of the insurance industry are required to undertake continuing education in various subjects in order to maintain their state licenses. drone pilot training should be of a similar professional quality well beyond FAA’s Part 107.
With the advent of drones, thousands of companies have entered the marketplace hoping to sell their devices and/or services to commercial operators and companies. Thousands of individuals around the country are openly using drones, with numerous others doing so discreetly. But who fosters the proper integration of drones into these insurance organizations?
In some cases, that falls to commercial companies without any insurance industry background. Others end up having to utilize hobbyists turned entrepreneurs. Part 107 certification has lowered the barrier to entry for the technology and created tremendous opportunities, but receiving certification requires little more than passing a multiple choice only exam that's designed for a 16-year-old high school student. It falls well short of the standardized proficiency which the public expects from the men and women who we depend on.
After all, learning to fly figure 8's or an obstacle course around a park may teach you good maneuvering skills, but it doesn’t teach you how to evaluate the impact area of a disaster, inspect complex building facades or rooftops, and evaluate claims efficiently, accurately and safely.
No one wants to find out in the midst of a disaster that his or her drone training has not prepared them for the situation at hand. To insure this never happens, when acquiring training for you or your company, look for a company that has practical training and experience in the insurance industry and drones for the unique applications that you require like commercial and residential property, infrastructure and utilities, agriculture, automotive and more.
But most importantly ensure the company and the instructors have solid training and experience in the insurance industry and integrating drones. A company that’s instructors actually have utilized drones for pre and post loss such as risk engineering, damage assessment, natural disaster monitoring, inspections, risk assessment, claims adjudication and fraud prevention.
If you would like more information on how EMMU Aerial can assist your organization, please visit our main webpage at EMMU Aerial, or feel free to contact us at via emails at EMMU Aerial.