The lender saw the communication channel grow in popularity from handling 20 per cent of incoming new business questions when it first launched, to 50 per cent today.
“We introduced this service based on broker feedback. Our focus was on personal contact, conversation and getting straight to an adviser. There are no bots involved and no automated or scripted responses,” said Keith Williams, intermediary operations manager at Coventry for Intermediaries.
“The younger generation of brokers, particularly, have adopted it, and the experience of brokers, and of our policy experts internally, has been positive,” Williams said.
The lender introduced the cloud-based technology alongside telephone support, with the same team of advisers crossing between channels.
The chat function was dedicated solely to new business lending policy enquiries, while the telephony service additionally offers support also across areas like products transfers, systems support and case processing.
The web-chat conversations have typically lasted for up to 30 minutes and the average wait-time for queries to be picked up is 33 seconds, the lender said.
There are currently no plans to expand the service, however, Williams said: “You can imagine in the future how it would be possible to add additional functionality, like video.”
