Outlook Money Insurance Summit 2nd Edition
Outlook Money Insurance Summit 2nd edition | watch our life Insurance panel sharing their key insights on Covid’s Impact On The Future Of Life Insurance
Ashish Vohra, Executive Director & CEO, Reliance Nippon Life Insurance Company Limited
Kamlesh Rao, Managing Director & CEO, Aditya Birla SunLife Insurance Co. Ltd.
Mahesh Balasubramanian, Managing Director & CEO, Kotak Mahindra Life Insurance Co. Ltd.
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Ashish Vohra, Executive Director & CEO, Reliance Nippon Life Insurance Company Limited
Kamlesh Rao, Managing Director & CEO, Aditya Birla SunLife Insurance Co. Ltd.
Mahesh Balasubramanian, Managing Director & CEO, Kotak Mahindra Life Insurance Co. Ltd.
#Insurance #BFSI #Finance #GeneralInsurance #insurancesummit #OutlookMoney #Money #OutlookMagazine #OutlookGroup
Follow this story and more: https://www.outlookindia.com/
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NewsTranscript
00:00 Hello and welcome to the second edition of the Outlook Money Insurance Summit.
00:09 The topic of discussion today is COVID's impact on the future of life insurance.
00:15 And we have with us eminent industry leaders, Ashish Vohra, Executive Director and CEO of
00:20 Reliance Nipun Life Insurance, Kamlesh Rao, MD and CEO, Aditya Birla Sun Life Insurance
00:26 and Mahesh Bala Subramanian, MD and CEO, Kotat Mahindra Life Insurance.
00:31 A very happy new year to all of you and thank you so much for joining me today for this
00:35 discussion.
00:36 So diving straight into today's topic, the COVID pandemic affected almost everyone in
00:42 more ways than one.
00:43 And not just individuals, but industries and sectors as well.
00:48 And that includes the insurance sector, of course.
00:51 So when it comes to the insurance industry, what is that one major change that was seen
00:56 because of the pandemic that all of you witnessed?
01:00 And maybe Kamlesh, you can go first on this.
01:02 Thank you Smriti.
01:03 And my first reaction to that would be, for us, I think two or three things changed in
01:10 a big way.
01:11 I think we witnessed BCP of its kind for the first time, when the whole country would be
01:18 out of action and out of work and therefore I think tested our digital capabilities and
01:23 technology to the hilt.
01:25 That was one big thing that we're learning.
01:29 And I think on the customer side, over the last one or two years, the two big things
01:34 that we are seeing is risk awareness and risk averseness.
01:40 Both for customers has gone up significantly.
01:44 And I think in some ways, that has really helped the life insurance industry.
01:51 And the two things that normally get impacted when these go up is two questions get asked,
01:56 which is important from an insurance point of view, am I insured?
02:00 And for all those people who are insured are asking themselves the question, am I insured
02:04 enough?
02:05 So I think these have been broad changes for us as an impact of the course.
02:11 Ashish, what would you say to that?
02:13 What was that one major change that really the insurance sector saw because of COVID?
02:17 I think to me, in addition to what Kamlesh is saying, one big thing that happened was
02:26 that organizations needed to stand up and demonstrate agility.
02:31 Agility is something we used to read about in textbooks, preach about it, talk about
02:36 it.
02:37 Now, here was a time where we had to stand up and really demonstrate that organizational
02:42 agility is possible.
02:44 Now agility meant working remote, agility meant pushing your digital capabilities to
02:51 the hilt.
02:52 Agility meant different ways of articulating to the customer.
02:58 Agility meant even prioritizing to say which kind of customers will I reach out more to
03:05 at this time.
03:06 For example, agility for us meant existing customers cross-sell is going to be easier
03:11 in times when face-to-face meetings is going to be difficult.
03:16 Agility meant managing triple the number of claims without impacting customer service
03:24 and customer delivery because this is the time he needs delivery the most.
03:29 I don't think any insurance company was geared up to manage 3x, 4x the number of claims and
03:35 therefore that needed us to move people, move manpower, operate remotely, operate 24x7 in
03:43 shifts to be able to deliver value to customer at the time when he needs it most.
03:49 So my one word answer, what did the insurance industry witness?
03:54 Agility, demand for agility and delivery of agility.
03:59 And what would you say Mahesh to that if we were to ask that what was one major takeaway
04:05 that you saw in the insurance sector during COVID?
04:08 I think risk.
04:10 I think I actually used to work in the general insurance industry where claims and risk were
04:14 really something was a day-to-day topic which was discussed.
04:18 But I think here the whole idea of mortality and claims itself is something I don't think
04:23 the industry had ever witnessed this kind of a scenario.
04:27 So I think COVID moved from unknown, unknown to some extent a known, unknown now.
04:33 And hopefully by the end of this pandemic it will become a known, known.
04:36 We hope it will become endemic.
04:38 So I think the entire area of risk management, understanding risk, ability to assess risk,
04:44 and the fact that if something can happen, has a probability of happening, it might happen.
04:49 So it's no longer in the realm of what you call probability.
04:53 It can happen and organizations need to be ready to assess the impact and move forward
04:58 and operate when the event actually comes into the fore.
05:03 So I think that's the biggest learning.
05:05 And I think across the industry, I would say not only at Codec Life, but I'm sure the industry
05:09 is really measured up to this ability to manage in these kind of environments.
05:13 A lot of things have changed from the day we entered the pandemic to where we are today,
05:17 right in the middle of a wave three.
05:20 I think the entire understanding of risk, pricing risk, I think insurers would have
05:25 become a lot more wiser.
05:26 I think I've graded more, I'm sure all my other colleagues have either lost hair or
05:31 graded more on risk management.
05:33 So all of you have mentioned that, of course, the claims went up during the pandemic period
05:38 and there were way more claims to settle than usual.
05:41 So how did it affect the balance sheet of companies?
05:44 And how did you take, was it a loss or how was the revenue kind of balanced in view of
05:53 the claims?
05:55 I think let me go there first, because I think we were the first out in the market as well.
05:59 Way back in, I think, June, Codec Life sent a letter to our shareholders and to be saying
06:06 that, look, we are looking at extra provisioning related mortality and therefore we had to
06:12 tell the market about the upcoming numbers that we are going to report for the particular
06:16 quarter.
06:17 I think the biggest challenge was assessment of the claims itself.
06:21 What is coming in, what has come in already, what is likely to come in.
06:25 And our businesses are of varied types.
06:27 We have a group term insurance, which is the employer-employee, then there is a credit
06:30 term, there is an individual term, and then there is an individual protection for business.
06:35 So I think the most important thing was to assess the impact of the excess mortality
06:39 on each of these lines of business, because each of these lines of business actually will
06:43 behave very differently to the same pandemic.
06:45 Let me give you an example of why it will behave differently.
06:49 See wave one was all about senior citizens, wave one was all about a different demographic
06:53 kind of population.
06:54 Wave two was about urban India.
06:56 Wave two was about employees who are 30, 35, 40 year olds working in middle-aged, working
07:03 in the corporate sector.
07:05 Not that it didn't affect the rest of the country, but it was about urban India.
07:09 You had Bangalore, you had Chennai, you had Hyderabad, you had Delhi, you had Calcutta,
07:13 Mumbai, these were the cities which were really seeing a swarm of mortality getting reported.
07:19 So I think one need to assess the impact of what it's going to be on different segments.
07:23 Now, if you're an employer-employee business, this is the first business which gets affected
07:27 because urban India employees were dying.
07:30 These are the same people who take loans from various companies.
07:35 Any bank or any lender would probably lend to a salaried class, an employee of any of
07:39 the top IT companies or FMCG companies or other companies, software companies out there
07:44 because they have the best credit.
07:46 So therefore, if you have been in the group term, it's going to affect the credit term
07:49 as well.
07:50 Then we have a microfinance segment, which is slightly different.
07:52 It is credit term, but a different segment.
07:55 In microfinance, the impact we realized was going to be lower because the mortality was
07:59 anyway elevated even during pre-COVID times.
08:02 So it's a question of the delta mortality getting built up in those three months.
08:07 How is it going to sit on top of the existing mortality that you had anyway budgeted for
08:11 or anyway planned for in your business?
08:13 So doing this entire assessment was a very complex exercise.
08:17 And I must say at Kodak Life, we were very happy that we got on the curve very early
08:22 and we were able to predict with a reasonable amount of accuracy.
08:24 And I think we made some provisions in the first quarter, and that stood us in good stead
08:28 for the entire year.
08:30 So I think the assessing this impact in terms of various lines of business and what is going
08:34 to be the extra mortality that we need to provide for was in itself a very big challenge,
08:38 at least that's what we realized at Kodak Life.
08:42 But also in a way, it was unpredictable as in the number of deaths.
08:46 I mean, initially, the second wave was not taken so seriously.
08:50 And then suddenly, the numbers went up like anything.
08:54 So how did you come to terms with the whole business proposition in that sense?
09:01 Kamlesh or Ashish, if you want to come in on that.
09:04 Niti, I think, let me answer that in two parts.
09:10 One is how do you do the mathematical modeling?
09:13 Mahesh talked about some of that in Reliance Nippon Life, we borrowed some of this know-how
09:19 from Nippon Life, because really, the domestic market had not seen a pandemic.
09:25 All we had seen is some earthquakes, floods and things like those.
09:29 And therefore, there is a very different way you model the localized mortality in events
09:34 like those.
09:35 But when it comes to a nationwide pandemic, moving at a particular pace, the way you model
09:41 it is very different.
09:43 And like we were talking before the call started, we created very sensitive dashboards that
09:48 talked about which line of business in how many days or in how many weeks is going to
09:54 produce what kind of mortality and what impact.
09:58 And therefore, you try and steer against it.
10:01 It is an inevitable that's going to hit you.
10:05 And you steer against it by trying to leverage other revenue lines.
10:09 Can you move product mix in a particular manner to bring about releases on the bottom line?
10:15 Can you manage expenses in a particular manner?
10:17 Can you postpone some elements out there?
10:21 Thankfully, the investment side did well.
10:24 And therefore, those created some buffers and some countermeasures for us.
10:29 So that part is about how do you model and how do you come to terms and how do you deal
10:33 with it?
10:34 And how do you build countermeasures to still manage the bottom line without dramatically
10:40 upsetting everything?
10:42 Having said that, quarter one was a very large loss for us, like Mahesh was saying, for the
10:46 whole industry, everybody went 3x or 4x on claims and therefore that had to be negative
10:52 on the bottom line.
10:54 Let me sort of add a slightly different flavor to this Nidhi.
10:59 At least in our company, we did not spend a lot of time fretting about it.
11:04 It is inevitable.
11:05 How do you manage it is the best way to think about it, but you don't fret about it.
11:09 In real terms, the life insurance industry is built for times like these, isn't it?
11:17 End of the day, we sold a promise to the customers to say, if something happens, God forbid,
11:22 if something happens, we are there.
11:24 If that is the promise we sold, when the time comes to deliver to that promise, we don't
11:29 sit and fret about it.
11:30 So we're quite okay with that.
11:32 I think that is the dharma of the whole industry that we will deliver on the claim side.
11:37 And I'm so glad to say that we are at like 99% on claim settlement ratio as we speak.
11:46 And so is the whole industry.
11:47 Everybody is above 98%.
11:49 So in times like these, when claims were 3x, the whole industry went up in terms of claim
11:55 settlement ratio.
11:57 And therefore that I think is the other perspective on the whole game to say, how do you model?
12:04 But at the same time, we were built for times like these, we carry adequate reserves for
12:09 times like these.
12:10 And we are happy to take the loss.
12:12 We are happy to take that one quarter, two quarter of damage.
12:16 Because end of the day, we are building a deep industry and it is building faith in
12:20 the sector to say, right, this is a financial product we want to be investing x% of our
12:26 savings in.
12:27 So that brings me to another question.
12:30 Like we were discussing, a lot of middle-aged people lost their lives, a lot of families
12:35 lost their breadwinners.
12:37 And this whole pandemic also had this impact of people becoming more aware of the importance
12:44 of life insurance, health insurance, also life insurance because of so many, because
12:50 the mortality rate was so high.
12:52 So did that also mean that it translated into more business for you over the period that
12:59 after the second wave was over, did you see an increase in demand?
13:04 Because at one level, maybe you did take losses, but perhaps the number of buyers or number
13:11 of policyholders who were interested in these products were not aware so much earlier, now
13:17 increased.
13:18 So how was the experience on that front?
13:20 COVID definitely hit a lot of life insurance companies.
13:24 But like Ashish mentioned, I mean, we are in the business of creating reserves for such
13:30 turbulent times.
13:32 But it also created an opportunity.
13:35 Life insurance is seen as more of a push product.
13:39 I don't know that I can call it pull.
13:41 But I think the nudges that we needed for people to think about life insurance has gone
13:44 up significantly.
13:46 And that will tell you whether the protection demand is gone up by an x percentage for different
13:50 but industry in general, it has gone up by about 30-40%.
13:52 There was also a time where interest rates started coming down.
13:58 Of course, before going up right now, there was a period when they started coming down.
14:02 And therefore, people started looking at life insurance products, which we offer on savings
14:07 platforms, as significantly as what we offer on the protection platform.
14:11 So it was not just about term plans.
14:13 But there are a lot of products that we offer on savings on guarantee basis for 20 years,
14:18 30 years and 40 years and that's a reasonably large uptake.
14:23 We saw uptakes on, you know, it typically meant that if you reach out to 10 customers,
14:29 and one would tell you that he's interested, we saw that number go at least by two times,
14:33 which means we saw some doubling in terms of our prospecting to conversion ratios.
14:37 If you look at the productivity by and large for the industry and for some companies, it
14:40 actually helped that going up.
14:43 And therefore, if you look at over the last one and a half, two years, this is one industry
14:47 that is growing in a very stable and steady fashion.
14:51 Last year in the first year of COVID, it grew by about 8 to 10%, currently growing at about
14:56 20%.
14:57 And within that the private growing at about 30%.
15:00 And a large part of that has come on better efficiency, which basically means that we've
15:05 gotten upside on the top line, but we were able to manage our costs better.
15:10 So the economies are looking better.
15:12 So yes, you would have had an impact like Ashish and Mahesh mentioned about claims,
15:16 but that is something that we should provide for and build in and that's the essence of
15:20 a 30-40 year investment company like a life insurance company.
15:25 But it has had its benefits in terms of uptake in business over the last two years.
15:30 And we see that as the third wave is hitting.
15:33 We look at, you know, there's an interesting data on as and when you see the new ways coming
15:37 in whether on the online platform, are there the search for insurance or protection or
15:42 something goes up, it goes up exponentially.
15:44 And the other worry that I always have, I've been in the financial services industry for
15:48 27 years is, is the memory of Indians short?
15:52 And is there a time that this will go up and again go away?
15:54 But you know, for what I have seen in the last two years time, and for what like Mahesh
15:58 said, so many unknowns that we now believe can happen.
16:03 You know, when we started, we thought this will go away in three weeks or three months
16:06 or six months, it is here to stay for two years time.
16:09 I think what has happened is going to make sure that the life insurance industry will
16:14 actually do significantly well on a sustainable basis for maybe the next three to five years
16:19 kind of time.
16:20 Let's all hope for that because, you know, insurance is a product that people need, but
16:25 a lot of people do not understand this whole, you know, this idea of, you know, not imagining
16:32 your death and looking at it as a morbid product and all of that, especially when it comes
16:37 to life insurance.
16:38 But you were talking about that whole search thing and how you can see the searches going
16:44 on now, now that we are pretty much in the middle of wave three.
16:48 How much has digitalization made a difference in terms of, you know, even when it came to
16:54 settling claims during the peak of second wave and I'm assuming, you know, a lot of
16:59 the, you know, the flow of claims would be much higher on a daily basis.
17:05 So did that help in any way and how did that kind of made systems more efficient?
17:11 Ashish, if you would like to take that.
17:13 Like one of the speakers was mentioning, it tested digital capabilities very significantly.
17:21 And again, let me talk about claims as one part and then business as another part on
17:25 digitalization.
17:27 On the claim side, the whole digitalization is mostly around managing the communication
17:35 between branches and the head office.
17:38 Bulk of us have central processing of claims.
17:42 Now bulk of the processing beyond of that, the document inspection, et cetera, is mostly
17:48 physically done.
17:49 So digitalization really helps in managing the communication.
17:52 Like you log in into a branch and the consumer behavior on the life insurance side continues
17:57 to remain that they submit a claim in the branch while facilities are available that
18:03 you do it centrally, but the take up rate of some of that is not there.
18:06 Somehow consumer confidence, I went to the branch, I submitted the claim, I got a tappa
18:11 appears to be of a higher order.
18:13 So that part is not so digital, it continues to be physical.
18:19 But the transmission, the receiving is instantaneous.
18:22 And beyond of that, it is sort of manual again.
18:24 What is digital is the credit to the customer's account that happens instantaneously.
18:30 Almost 99% of it is now through NIFT, et cetera.
18:34 The other impact of digitalization and besides searches, et cetera, is really how insurance
18:40 companies have managed hither to manual processes by converting them to digital.
18:46 So how do you recruit digitally?
18:48 How do you assess an employee digitally?
18:50 How do you, without getting into very far-fetched OPQ kind of models, et cetera, how are you
18:56 able to do scale assessments in a digital kind of a manner?
19:02 How are you able to offer customized proposals to customers specific to their age, et cetera,
19:10 specific to their liking in a digital manner to aid in conversion rates of 1 is to 10 becoming
19:16 say 2 is to 10 and things like those.
19:19 So my personal view, the digitalization in claims is of a lesser order.
19:26 Unlike the general insurance industry and Mahesh will tell us about the big difference
19:30 between the GI claim settlement side and the LI claim settlement side.
19:35 But on the other side, on making several of the manual processes become digitally oriented
19:40 so that they are more repeatable, so that they are more predictable, I think is the
19:44 larger impact of digitalization more so in the COVID time.
19:48 All of us had toolings like these, the utilization of those was 30%, 40%.
19:54 As lockdowns came in, as difficulty of customer appointments came in, the utilization of those
19:59 digital assets went up to 60%, 70% and things like those.
20:04 Okay.
20:05 So what I'm getting is also that it was more on the process side and not really the customers,
20:12 especially on the claim side, maybe not on buying and all that, maybe KYC and all that
20:17 being done digitally.
20:19 But when it came to claims, it was not really that it came into clear digitalization because
20:26 we have been hearing a lot about it.
20:28 So I was just wondering that, how come it was just processes and not really, because
20:33 a lot of other, another panel that I was talking to, some of them also mentioned that even
20:41 the claims processing in terms of people's money getting debited into their accounts
20:46 and all of that got a push because of digitalization.
20:52 But you really would say that.
20:56 The crediting of the money, definitely 99% is digital.
21:00 I was mentioning more around how do customers submit life insurance claims, those kinds
21:05 of things.
21:06 I must also tell you that depending upon what business models are there amongst us also,
21:12 there might be some differences out there.
21:14 Now we operate a significant amount of tier 3, tier 4.
21:18 Now there is a particular consumer psyche that operates in the tier 3, tier 4 that still
21:23 believes in the physical walk to the branch.
21:26 That is not quite the metro behavior maybe.
21:29 So each of us has somewhat different, so we don't sell as much through banks.
21:35 So the behavior over there tends to become somewhat different.
21:38 So when you are not selling so much through banks and you are a tier 3, tier 4, there
21:43 is a higher dependence on physical because that's your consumer set and therefore you
21:48 tailor make your claims acceptance processes depending upon what they would like.
21:53 They are more comfortable coming to you.
21:55 Nidhi, I just want to add to what Ashish is saying is relevant.
22:00 So I think you got to differentiate the ability today of somebody being able to make a claim
22:06 digitally versus the actual execution of the thinking of the customers on the ground.
22:11 So to the extent like Ashish mentioned, the enablement on all life insurance companies
22:16 is up the curve significantly during the COVID period.
22:19 It was a different method in lockdowns that method availability was different.
22:24 Ashish rightfully mentioned if you are in tier 3, tier 4 and obviously the consumer
22:28 behavior determines the utilization.
22:30 I just want to differentiate and say that the ability for a life insurance company to
22:34 do a claim digitally I think is up there.
22:36 It's the constitution of your business.
22:38 We also experience we are there in tier 3, tier 4.
22:41 We have a large banker partner, say in HTSC.
22:44 There everything happens digitally because the customer data is very easy and that is
22:48 available with the bank.
22:49 So there is no need for any kind of a physical process in that sense.
22:54 So from an ability point of view, I think it is up there and it really accentuated in
22:59 the two, three waves of COVID and but depending on the model of your business, depending on
23:04 which markets you are present in but the most important thing is to date the money going
23:09 into the customer account like Ashish mentioned and rightfully so to the extent of close to
23:13 98-99% is completely on any FD basis.
23:17 All those things of giving money on cheques and all that stuff is all long past gone and
23:23 definitely the pandemic scenario accelerated this both for the life insurance companies
23:29 as well as for consumer behavior changing significantly than what they used to do in
23:33 the past.
23:34 So I think that is the only point I was trying to make.
23:37 Just wanted to add one thing.
23:39 A lot of us also have started doing it, giving the customers a lot of do-it-yourself platforms,
23:44 do-it-yourself interfaces for the entire policy servicing activity, which includes claims
23:49 as well as part of the and I think the uptake on that has been explosive because customers
23:55 also realize that this is probably the safest and best way of doing it.
23:58 While Ashish, I do agree that tier 3, tier 4, they prefer probably going to the branch
24:02 and taking the tappa etc. there are also lots of customers who have graduated to doing it
24:06 all through a mail or going through interfaces that we have provided them.
24:11 So I think the utilization has been phenomenally higher compared to what we could even imagine
24:17 and certainly compared to the past.
24:21 That was my sense too and in fact that's a very pertinent point because tier 3 and tier
24:26 4 I can completely, I completely agree with Ashish what he is saying because also the
24:31 uptake, it also depends on the uptake of digitization.
24:34 So definitely it can't be compared with something that is there in the metros or main urban
24:40 centers.
24:41 So definitely that has been a stride that the insurance industry has taken matched by
24:45 COVID again.
24:46 Or you think about group claims, maybe another way to think about it group claims.
24:51 Group claims is 100% digitally submitted because there's a corporate out there who's collecting
24:57 all the documents and who's submitting it to you.
24:58 Now that part of the business that we have is 100% digital.
25:02 It is submitted digitally, the money is created digitally.
25:05 So your premise or your other groups view on this part of digital is actually true when
25:13 it comes to the whole group credit life, group term kind of businesses.
25:16 So depending upon your business model, depending upon where you see it, your experience could
25:21 be a little varied but yeah, capability of life insurers to manage the whole gamut of
25:27 things through an app or through digital means, etc. is up there.
25:33 It's completely up there.
25:35 That's good to hear.
25:36 So another thing that Kamlesh was also talking about is the kind of insurance products that
25:40 people are now interested in.
25:42 So my sense was that, you know, this whole thing of the importance of protection that
25:47 people suddenly realized after COVID, that perhaps the uptake of term insurance has gone
25:52 up more than other kinds of products.
25:55 But it's also the, of course, the interest rate scenario has also pushed the traditional
26:01 investment products, which may be giving a better rate than your FDs or instruments like
26:08 that.
26:09 So what, according to your experience has been, you know, which kind of products have
26:15 become more popular after COVID?
26:17 Mahesh, if you would like to take it.
26:18 Well, actually, we are in a good time.
26:20 Look at the three aspects of our business.
26:22 Unit length markets are doing very well.
26:24 I think there is a play out there in unit length where customers are looking at equity
26:29 linked products.
26:30 Right.
26:31 So there is a play out there.
26:32 There are companies which are a little bit more unit linked and you see them growing
26:35 as well.
26:36 There is pure term demand.
26:38 I only hope that all of us will be able to cater to the demand in terms of keeping our
26:43 pricing still in an area where the customers can still buy.
26:47 We are still having issues with our reinsurers and there is a whole gamut of things happening
26:51 on the pricing side there.
26:53 Right.
26:54 So there is certainly a growth for demand.
26:56 Demand is there for the protection side.
26:58 On the traditional side, I think people also realizing that we protect customers in terms
27:03 of some of our offerings, in terms of protecting them from falling interest rates.
27:06 Right.
27:07 So therefore, there is also a healthy demand right out there for traditional products because
27:11 the short term interest rates are because of the excess liquidity in the system.
27:15 The FD rates, of course, they are moving up as we speak, but the interest rates for three
27:19 or four FDs today look far inferior compared to a traditional plan of an insurance company,
27:25 which is anyway tax free as well.
27:27 So to my mind, I think it's a good time to be there.
27:30 I think unit linked is doing well for those who are focused on unit linked.
27:34 People who are focused on par or non-par, I think they are getting their growth, whoever
27:38 has got the ability to grow in these times in terms of capacity and agents and products
27:42 out there.
27:43 And the term insurance is also growing.
27:44 So I think it's a great time to be in life insurance, I would say.
27:48 I can't really say one is growing at the cost of the other.
27:53 I just wanted to make a point, I think protection and term, there is protection in every product
28:00 that we do.
28:01 Yes.
28:02 So I'm saying if you look at term, we are construed as term, but term for the industry
28:07 is not even, it just goes to about upper single digit or close to 10%, 11% for the industry.
28:14 But shouldn't that go up?
28:19 Shouldn't that go up is the wish that all life insurance companies have.
28:23 But you know, at a point in time today, where the claims experience has been not so great,
28:29 both for life insurance companies as well as reinsurers.
28:32 And remember that the pricing of term products is determined more by the reinsurer than by
28:36 perhaps the life insurer.
28:38 And a lot has changed.
28:39 As I talked to you, we are in a big situation where the increase in the price on term will
28:44 be anywhere between give or take 25 to 30 or 35%.
28:48 So you know, I made this comment in some other forum that maybe at a time where the demand
28:53 for term could have been the highest, it's just that the price increase has just come
28:57 at a very inopportune time.
28:59 I say inopportune, but I you know, we've had the brunt of the same thing in the claims
29:04 both for insurers.
29:05 So that's a problem that we can't solve at this point in time.
29:11 So it's here to stay.
29:12 It should go up, it went up in the between the first wave and the second wave, but the
29:16 price increases have happened as I speak to you and bulk of us have passed on the increase
29:20 in the price in the first week of second week of third week of January.
29:23 So we have to wait and see what will how will that impact consumer offtakes.
29:28 So we and remember in life insurance, if you're buying a term product today, then you got
29:33 to pay the same premium for the next 25 or 30 years time.
29:37 So if the pandemic goes away and the price changes after one year's time frame, you buy
29:42 today you got to pay the same premium for the next 30-40 years.
29:45 Like Mahesh said, but yeah, go on.
29:50 So I was actually my next question was also on that, that you know, the pricing of term
29:55 insurance, like you rightly mentioned is perhaps going up at an inopportune time when you know,
30:01 the demand might be going up for this kind of protective plan, which is, you know, giving
30:06 you a larger cover at perhaps a lower rate.
30:10 So do you think that might be a deterrent in terms of the uptake and demand that you
30:15 know, that has been going up that has been seen that has been seen recently?
30:20 So we don't we don't know as yet, it's too early to comment.
30:23 But remember, India has been one of the cheapest markets for term, okay, across if you look
30:29 at anywhere in Asia, India will still be amongst the cheapest for term insurance products.
30:34 The claim experience is there.
30:36 I mean, you can't run away from that both for us as well as for the reinsurers, they
30:40 call for a particular change in pricing.
30:42 And that is what the price is going to be for the next maybe a year or two.
30:46 I'm not very sure.
30:47 Now, everybody asks me what is my view on the post pandemic scenario?
30:50 And my only answer is you tell me when is the post pandemic scenario and then I will
30:54 tell you my view on the post pandemic because every time we think it is just about to get
30:58 over it looks like a new variant comes in.
31:01 So not knowing that I'm not very sure whether I can see whether the pricing is right or
31:06 no but even after this increase, if you look at the price of a term insurance product in
31:11 India, it is still fairly priced.
31:13 If it is going to be like that for everybody, I think it will find a level playing field
31:16 whether the uptake will continue.
31:18 I mean, it's just too early to tell.
31:20 But as I said, that is 10% at best or 8% of the business of insurance companies.
31:26 We do very interesting work in either marketing products or traditional products and we've
31:31 seen an uptake of that in the last two years by 40%.
31:36 And like I said, it's a good time and that's my belief that that is here to stay and will
31:39 augur well for life insurance companies over the next two, three years.
31:43 So that's there but there's always this debate between whether insurance should be into investment.
31:50 Of course, there are so many investment products and they have their own good and bad parts
31:56 pros and cons.
31:58 But Ashish, what would you say because for example, if people are locking into insurance
32:05 comp investment plans right now because the FD rates are low, but perhaps these plans
32:10 are 10 years longer and perhaps they would have locked in an FD for five years.
32:15 So how does that kind of work for them?
32:19 It's the same question to say what is the right time to buy property and it's very difficult
32:23 to give an answer to that as well.
32:25 But let me try and attempt a response.
32:28 The consumer behavior and sort of picking onto this term debate that was happening just
32:35 now.
32:36 I mean, I have sort of learned to see consumer behavior as a kind of a continuum.
32:42 On one end of the continuum, let's call it the left side is all about me buying an insurance
32:48 policy as an investment and as a saving for the next 10, 15, 20 years and the term part
32:54 of it is incidental.
32:58 And on the right side of that continuum is a very sophisticated mutual fund buyer buying
33:05 a specified amount of term, also having some ULFs, etc.
33:10 And on this continuum, there are several roads and branches to say, what are the nuances
33:16 across all of these.
33:18 This debate as to what is my orientation has been on for a long time.
33:24 And I think the complication here is not just how the consumer thinks, the complication
33:29 here is also about how the seller explains it.
33:33 So we've seen the impact of training, we've seen the impact of certain channels which
33:37 operate a certain product category in a certain manner.
33:40 Put together is this whole complicated situation called what are the right product choices
33:46 and what are the right timings and what are the right ways to buy it.
33:50 In short, there is no one correct prescription on the whole thing.
33:56 Let me give you a slightly different flavor on this.
34:00 We do a large amount of renewal calling, we built a large amount of propensity models
34:04 on persistency collections and things like those and especially people who bought investment
34:09 products end up saying that no, I've paid for three years.
34:13 Now I want to go into a holiday period and take my money out later.
34:17 There is this debate that keeps happening all the time.
34:19 We've done a fairly large amount of work to say what happened to the monies of customers
34:24 who invested in a ULIP 10 years ago or in a traditional product 10 years ago.
34:32 And we do this calculation at the time of maturity, etc. to say, did you make a right
34:36 decision or no?
34:37 And you compare it with the nifty returns over a 10-year period and then you adjust
34:41 for tax benefits and things like those.
34:44 The broad answer to this is that more often than not, and I would hesitate to hazard a
34:49 guess on what is that more often or not, is it 60 or 70 or 80% but to a very large extent,
34:56 to a very large degree, people who remained invested on their decision to buy a life insurance
35:02 product 10 years ago, beat the market in terms of returns.
35:06 And when you adjust that back for taxation, etc., they did a damn good deal at that point
35:12 of time, more often than not.
35:13 Now there could always be that outlier, there could always be a portfolio, there could always
35:18 be a product.
35:19 But more often than not, when you do this back testing, when you do this analysis, the
35:23 net result is that life insurance gave them good returns, better than market returns,
35:29 adjusted for tax.
35:30 It is definitely good.
35:31 And we are talking about ULIPs here.
35:33 We are talking about ULIPs, we are also talking about guarantees.
35:38 Now we are definitely discussing guarantees out here.
35:42 Now you look at the current market situation and FD is at about say 5% or 5.25% and there
35:47 are guarantees available between 5.5 and 6%.
35:51 And then there is the taxation benefit and the life insurance benefit that comes across.
35:56 And these guarantees are being sold for 10, 15, 20, 25 years.
36:01 The guarantees I sell, my company sells is for a total of 28 years is the maximum tenure.
36:06 Now why is this not a good deal?
36:08 I think it's a damn good deal to say that an FD gets me 5 or 5.25% and it's taxable.
36:13 I have a taxation advantage, I can get 5.75% and death cover and a guarantee for 28 years
36:21 that come what may, you will get these returns.
36:24 Most customers we meet see this as a very favorable equation at this point in time.
36:29 You should also keep in mind that, especially Kamlesh knows it, I have worked in banks,
36:35 there is something called asset allocation as well.
36:37 A customer does not look at each of this in isolation.
36:41 A customer who wants to invest, he feels, okay, I'm getting a guaranteed return of 6%
36:46 for 10 years, 20 years, that's a damn good deal.
36:49 So he says, okay, let me deploy some of my funds here, some of my funds in markets, some
36:53 of my funds in fixed deposits.
36:55 I think it's a question of a proper asset allocation.
36:58 And today we are seeing a lot of demand for guaranteed products, even on the bank assurance
37:03 platform.
37:04 Because customers, that's exactly what RMs are doing, talking to customers and allocating
37:08 their money, saying that, look here, I think time for you to put it because you're getting
37:11 a good return for 20 years.
37:12 And that's a locked in return.
37:15 So I think it's not a question of either or, it's a question of doing what is right for
37:19 the customer.
37:20 But more important thing about insurance is that one cardinal rule is it has to be locked
37:24 up.
37:25 So anything to do for short term, then I think that's where the insurance product really
37:30 does not really give the best results to the consumers.
37:34 As long as you're looking at long term, whether you call it unit length, whether you call
37:37 it par, non-par, whatever, traditional, I think if customers are having a horizon of
37:42 seven years, 10 years, 20 years, I think definitely there is a merit in looking at this instrument
37:47 as well.
37:48 Fair enough.
37:49 So another thing that I wanted to ask you gentlemen was that, what are the new innovations
37:55 that are expected in the life insurance space?
37:58 Because the pandemic has made people think about not just insurance, investments differently.
38:04 And we are discussing insurance as investments also.
38:07 So what are the new kind of innovations that are really on the table in terms of protection,
38:12 risk management, even channeling the savings and investments of customers?
38:17 See, I think the most important innovation people are talking about is flexibility for
38:22 the consumer.
38:23 Letting the consumers decide what they want, how much they want, when do they want it.
38:27 I think I'm seeing a lot of products launched by competition, launched by Kodak Life as
38:32 well.
38:33 I think the entire area of offering flexibility to customers.
38:37 In terms of the amount of cover the person wants to take, the way he wants to take back
38:40 the money once the maturity proceeds are available, the number of switches he's willing to make,
38:45 the number of times he can decide the tenure, the amount.
38:48 I think a whole range of flexibility is coming in, including, for instance, return on premium
38:53 has made a big impact now in term insurance because people are looking at return on premium
38:57 there as well.
38:58 People are talking about 5-pay products in term insurance.
39:01 5-pay and the cover is for 10 years and 20 years and 30 years.
39:05 So I think the whole area, which I think has taken a new dimension in the last two, three
39:09 years is the flexibility that insurance companies are offering to consumers rather than making
39:14 it a, what do you call a cookie cutter kind of a product.
39:17 This is my product, take it.
39:19 I think a whole lot of flexibility is coming.
39:22 That to my mind is the biggest change.
39:24 A slightly different flavor or a related flavor really to the whole flexibility part is the
39:31 return of what is called income plans.
39:34 Now income plans used to exist earlier.
39:36 It is not really new, but over the last year or so, I'm not sure only because of the pandemic,
39:44 but this thing called life insurance needs to be seen as a second income kind of a plan
39:50 to give you year on year returns has suddenly become more popular.
39:55 It's not really an innovation, but it is the same thing around flexibility that it is not
40:00 just about the lump sums or the endowments, but you want to get a cash flow stream for
40:05 the next.
40:06 So you pay for a seven year period and for the next 14 years or 21 years, you get an
40:11 annual cash flow stream has become popular.
40:13 And there are more and more products that are chasing the whole income variety.
40:17 Similarly, cash bonus is something that existed, but cash bonus on power plans has become now
40:23 more popular.
40:25 It tends to give a consumer comfort to say that is some money available every year.
40:30 And I'm not going to be waiting for 20 years to see my pot of gold at the end of it.
40:35 So those two to my mind, again, on the theme of flexibility itself is the feel of money
40:41 being closer to me and cash flows coming back sooner than later is the trend that we see
40:48 and more and more insurers are building products of this variety to cater to that sentiment.
40:52 Let me just complete that.
40:54 I think a lot has been shared by both Mahesh and Ashish, but I think fundamental shift
41:00 is towards simplicity.
41:03 Can we create our products which can be a little more simpler?
41:07 If you look at the buying process, I think we used to take a lot of time in terms of
41:11 making the customer understand what he's buying, and then the buying process, you're trying
41:15 to make what he's buying simpler.
41:18 Also, for every need, we were thinking of creating a product in the past that for life
41:22 insurance used to do but if you look at the last two or three years, there is one standard
41:27 template and it has five variants or 10 variants to it.
41:32 You want to buy a term product, some of them want to buy and get the money only if something
41:36 happens to them.
41:37 Some of them are saying if I live, give me the money back like Mahesh said, my return
41:39 of premium comes in.
41:40 Some of them are saying if I live till 60, give me an annuity income after 60.
41:46 And the beautiful part about what life insurance companies are doing over the last three, four,
41:49 five years is they are building in all these options, depending on when you're buying the
41:54 fundamental product of firm through its various variants.
41:58 So you're able to take care of say, different customers thinking process in a singular product.
42:05 The other thing that is partly happening and you know, I mean, I've been more a banker
42:10 than a broker and life insurance is two and a half years old for me is to say, can we
42:14 play on different pitches?
42:16 And I don't know, Nidhi, even you being an editor in financial services in your mind,
42:21 when you differentiate term and protection, and not necessarily look at say, life insurance
42:27 as an opportunity on the saving side, because for all the guarantee products that we spoke
42:31 about, Ashish, Mahesh, me, it's like a great level playing field with fixed deposits.
42:36 It may not have the flexibility of a two year, three year fixed deposit.
42:40 But like Mahesh said, if you do asset allocation, there are some products that you plan for
42:44 two year, three years, there are some products that you want to plan for 10 years, you want
42:48 to do 10 year investment product with a bank, it's not possible, you don't get 10 year fixed
42:52 deposit.
42:53 I think the range, I think is extremely important from that point.
42:57 Yeah, I agree with that.
43:01 But I just want to put in there.
43:02 But what about a PPF that that will let me be there for 15 years, it's tax free, it's
43:06 a guaranteed income again.
43:08 So how do I compare as a long term investment in my debt portfolio, not the equity portfolio,
43:15 of course, how do I compare there?
43:17 But you have a limitation of how much, if you're doing an asset allocation, and you
43:22 say X amount of money, definitely a some amount of money of that will go towards PPF.
43:27 I'm not contesting or competing with that product.
43:31 But depending upon what kind of risk profile that you have, I mean, you know, people have
43:35 this constant debate between ULIP and mutual fund, and I've spent five years doing wealth
43:39 management business.
43:40 But like Mahesh said, if you compare ULIP for three years, versus a mutual fund, you're
43:46 going to always find it costly.
43:47 If you think you want to stay invested in ULIP over a seven year or eight year period,
43:52 it becomes as cost efficient or better than perhaps a mutual fund.
43:54 And if you're invested in a longer time cycle of the market, you will, like Aashiq said,
43:58 beat perhaps the return seven out of 10 times of even the NIFTY.
44:01 So I think the frame of reference has to be the time frame.
44:04 And if you look at that, and the various opportunities that today life insurance companies offer
44:09 on pure term, as well as the entire range of investment products, it definitely demands
44:14 a certain part of your portfolio and your asset allocation for sure.
44:18 So yeah, definitely, I've also noticed a lot of innovations are happening on the term insurance
44:22 product itself.
44:23 So there are riders like this coming return of premium coming in.
44:27 So do you think it in any way dilutes the very nature, the very basic concept of term
44:35 insurance?
44:36 Or do you think it's okay, like you said that, you know, it might cater to different needs?
44:40 So let me just give you a simple example.
44:43 And then, you know, the other panelists can take on.
44:45 You look at a salary customer.
44:47 I mean, he buys a term insurance cover, God forbid something happens, he'll have large
44:51 amount of loans, because everybody has a housing loan and something happens, he wants to make
44:55 sure it is secure.
44:56 Now you can do it through a group product, you can do it through a term product.
45:00 But if you live till 60, you don't need that liability any longer.
45:04 Okay.
45:05 So I mean, there are plans today, let's say you take a cover till about two crores or
45:07 one crore till 60, drop it down to 50 lakh rupees, it allows you to pay lesser premium
45:13 for your entire lifecycle period.
45:15 The purpose of what that term insurance is supposed to meet, it is still meeting, if
45:18 I'm converting the lump sum amount to a stream of annuity after 60, it is meeting its purpose,
45:24 because you live till 60.
45:25 And therefore, you're getting a stream of income right now, you live till 60, you want
45:29 your premiums back, great, because if something happens to you during the period, you get
45:33 10, 20, 30 times of that amount.
45:35 But if you live till 60, you're getting your entire premium back.
45:37 I mean, it gives you a holistic range of options without deviating from the fundamental principle
45:44 of what a term production protection is supposed to do.
45:47 So I think it's a great range to have in a single suite of products.
45:52 I think to each his own Nidhi, because there are lots of Indians who also want to see,
45:56 I made a premium, I didn't claim anything.
45:57 I come from GI, you know, many customers say, I have been making premiums for three years,
46:01 I didn't claim anything.
46:02 Whether it is motor insurance, or that's the psyche of some customers.
46:07 If I make a premium, if he has not made a claim, he feels he has lost something.
46:12 That's the way the Indian psyche works sometimes.
46:13 I think as long as we have the range available to each his own, it's not that financially
46:19 one product is what do you call inferior to the other.
46:23 Ultimately, it's all time value of money.
46:25 Where do you put, where do you place what in terms of time duration and therefore what's
46:30 the premium or the price that you're paying for it.
46:33 So I think the sheer flexibility that you offer makes it more inclusive, I would say.
46:37 In fact, it's good for the industry because for those 5% of the people who think, I want
46:42 to be a insurance company, right, we have a product for them as well.
46:44 This makes it more inclusive for getting more people into the insurance ambit.
46:48 That's true.
46:49 But that's also about, you know, at a certain level, it's also about awareness and knowledge
46:53 and you know, in general and understanding about what financial products can do for you,
46:59 what insurance can do for you.
47:00 Wouldn't you agree with that?
47:01 We have to do both, right?
47:04 Keep increasing the awareness at the same time getting them insured as well.
47:07 I can't wait for everybody to change and then come to me.
47:10 Right now, your current mindset thought process is this, I have a product, you come in as
47:13 well and we keep changing these mindsets.
47:15 I'm not saying we should not, but yeah, at least till then we are doing a good job of
47:19 including everybody.
47:20 Right.
47:21 So we are coming to an end of the session now.
47:27 So one thing that I would ask each of you is what are the big learnings from the pandemic
47:32 and what do you think are the next steps from here on?
47:35 Because, you know, COVID has opened up a lot of things for us as customers, as the industry
47:42 sector for you, the insurance sector for you.
47:45 So if you could just elaborate on what are the next steps and what were the biggest learnings
47:52 for you from this pandemic?
47:54 I think the memory of this is not going to be short.
47:57 So I keep saying that all the goodness that we have got into our firm and the industry,
48:03 we should not lose it when the pandemic goes away.
48:07 My key learnings are around the customer's buying process, the customer's engagement
48:12 process because there are two, three areas that we cover them in.
48:16 Is to say simplicity is important.
48:19 Make sure more information is available, something that you stress upon that, what am I offering
48:23 and what are the options that you have that you can actually pick on, but make it simple.
48:27 I think that's going to be extremely important during the selling process.
48:32 See I'm saying the whole journey of life insurance is seen as a little long.
48:38 How do we make it quicker?
48:39 How do we make it shorter?
48:41 If a fixed deposit can be issued across the counter, why can't our life insurance policy
48:44 be issued at the end of the day?
48:46 I mean, this is something that we've got to move to today, it's going to be a larger period
48:50 of time.
48:51 Then is the learning on data.
48:53 There's so much of data available and there's so much learning having been a banker to say
48:56 if a customer comes to you, can you be pre-prepared about what should needy buy rather than going
49:01 blank with whatever data or information is available about me?
49:05 Can I tell me that these are the possible two customers that you should buy, which is
49:08 different from what Ashish will buy versus what Mahesh will buy.
49:11 So you provide customization and hyper personalization to a customer in the selling process.
49:16 And most importantly, keep constantly working with the proof of the pudding of the life
49:20 insurance company is the moment of truth of claim.
49:24 And they're like, how can I make it simpler?
49:28 How can I make it quicker?
49:29 How can I engage with the nominees right now to tell them that God forbid, if something
49:33 happens to the proposal, what is it that you're supposed to do?
49:36 Because in India, 50% of the nominees don't even know that somebody has a life insurance.
49:40 The guys who know don't even know what the document they are supposed to put in if something
49:43 goes wrong.
49:44 How do we engage with the customer on an ongoing basis to make sure that when the proof comes
49:50 in, they can be far better prepared.
49:53 And one big change that the regulator is making, which is bringing wellness or health into
49:57 the whole ecosystem of life insurance, depending on how regulations pan out.
50:02 If that moves in my ability to engage with the customer through the entire journey of
50:06 the 10-15 years that he's with me can become significantly better and can become significantly
50:11 more interesting.
50:12 Thank you.
50:13 Ashish.
50:14 Let me sort of not repeat what Kamlesh has very eloquently said, those are realities
50:21 for the industry.
50:23 One of the things we're working on going forward from here is how do we issue a life insurance
50:30 policy in an over-the-counter manner.
50:33 And I'm staring at my phone, we've launched today a straight through processing concept
50:41 where we promise to the customer that if you agree to do everything digitally for us, if
50:48 you agree to give us the E-Aadhaar, if you go through DigiLocker, pay us a payment electronically
50:55 and we are able to dedupe you electronically, our promise is to issue him a policy in 20
51:01 minutes.
51:02 So I'm looking at my phone, we've just issued five policies today in a 20-minute from start
51:10 to end.
51:11 Issued meaning issued, delivered to the customer, not sent a letter or an SMS.
51:16 Sent electronically, obviously.
51:18 So to me, this is one of the important moves forward as to how do you make life insurance
51:25 a OTC kind of a product.
51:27 It encompasses this whole thing called simplicity.
51:31 It encompasses this whole thing called value delivery.
51:35 And there are reasons to do it.
51:36 There is minimal chance of free look cancellation.
51:39 There is minimal chance of dissonance later.
51:42 My mis-selling probability goes down very dramatically and I'm hoping it's the start
51:48 for us.
51:49 Today, we set out that 20-minute benchmark.
51:53 Hopefully that gets us more references.
51:55 Hopefully that makes people's networks grow faster.
51:59 So that's an added element of what we are working on, COVID or otherwise.
52:06 How do you use this momentum?
52:07 How do you use this market movement to be able to deliver more value to customer more
52:13 relevantly, more simply in a shorter period of time?
52:17 Thank you.
52:18 Mahesh, what's your take on the next steps and the big learnings?
52:21 I'll probably cover the aspect which Ashish and Kamli spoke a lot about customer.
52:26 So let me speak about internal customers, what to do with the employees and what to
52:31 do with agents because these are two big constituents for us.
52:33 I think as the great resignation is happening all over the globe, I think it's been a serious
52:38 challenge in terms of recruiting employees, engaging with them, keeping them out of the
52:43 fold and especially a player like Kotak, we believe a lot in our value systems and the
52:48 DNA and culture of the group and the organization.
52:51 So how do you really teach these COVID babies who have come during the COVID?
52:55 Some of them have exited even during the COVID period.
52:58 So that's something very disconcerting for all of us because we really pride in our culture
53:02 and pride in our ability to embrace people and bring them into a particular way of functioning.
53:07 So I think that to my mind, we need to work much more harder on it and try and be more
53:12 innovative and creative in our engagement with our customers and with our employees.
53:16 Second is the entire area of distribution in terms of how do we engage better, digitize.
53:21 CXUX is also all about the distributor himself because we're still a lot face-to-face driven
53:27 in terms of recruiting agents, agents going out in the market, talking to consumers while
53:32 the process is still digital in terms of digital interfaces being used.
53:35 Finally, the pitch is still being made by an agent.
53:38 So how do we really build better engagement, build productivity, recruit agents completely
53:44 on a digital mode?
53:45 In fact, we are evaluating whether we can already recruit agents into it on a WhatsApp
53:49 mode because WhatsApp is today offering a lot of business services.
53:53 So how do you really get in WhatsApp to build engagement better within your employees and
53:57 within your agents?
53:58 So I think from our side, I think enough focus should also be there on employee and the agent
54:04 in terms of how do we make them respond better to these kinds of scenarios and how do we
54:09 build continued productivity and scale in a continued environment of where we may not
54:15 be able to hire and meet them physically.
54:18 It has to be all done digitally, virtually rather.
54:21 Okay, okay.
54:22 That's great.
54:23 That's great.
54:24 I think the digital footprint will make a lot of difference to the company's lives and
54:30 the policyholders lives.
54:31 And I hope that also cuts down on, I think one of you mentioned that, that it will also
54:38 cut down on the whole scourge of mis-selling, if I shall put it like that, especially in
54:44 this tax saving season that we usually see.
54:47 How do we build a better world for ourselves?
54:52 Yeah.
54:53 Okay.
54:54 So on that note, thank you so much for taking out time from your busy schedules and participating
54:59 in this discussion and good day to all of you gentlemen.
55:04 Thank you.
55:05 Thank you.
55:06 Thank you.
55:07 Thank you, Nidhi.
55:08 Thank you, Aakash.
55:09 Nice seeing you, Mahesh.
55:10 Bye Mahesh.
55:11 Thank you.
55:12 Bye.
55:12 (upbeat music)