Odie: A Wellness-First, Tech-Enabled Pet Insurance Provider
Odie Pet Insurance is a forward-thinking American insurance company dedicated to democratizing pet health coverage. Odie was founded in 2019 with a mission to provide dog and cat owners with flexible and affordable insurance coverage, focusing on making high-quality pet care accessible to all. Odie offers insurance policies that are designed to eliminate the financial burden associated with caring for pets when unexpected illnesses and injuries occur. Odie is a successful brand with a compelling value proposition. It serves dog and cat owners across the U.S., supporting both pet owners and partners through a centralized digital platform. In 2024, Odie won Fintech Global’s Insurtech 100 award, recognizing its forward-thinking innovation.
Finding the Right Claims Management Solution
As Odie expanded its business and operations, it became clear that managing claims for a specialty line of business like pet insurance required a scalable and flexible claims management system (CMS). Pet insurance claims entail various sub-categories, like routine wellness visits, vaccinations, accidents, and illness coverage, each requiring different levels of attention and workflows. Odie needed a partner capable of delivering a platform that caters to the unique nuances of pet health claims.
Odie found the perfect match in Five Sigma, another innovative leader in the Insurtech landscape (and recipient of the 2024 Insurtech 100 award, like Odie), committed to transforming claims management operations through AI and automation.
Five Sigma developed an AI-native claims management platform that is perfect for any specialty insurance line. Five Sigma’s SaaS platform serves insurance companies of any size, scaling easily as the business grows. With Five Sigma’s easy, no-code configuration capabilities, Odie could customize its claims workflows based on the specific pet insurance policies it offers and specific claims sub-categories, allowing the platform to accommodate different coverage types and adapt quickly to Odie’s evolving business needs.
Odie Signs with Five Sigma
In June 2023, Odie became a Five Sigma customer, kicking off a collaboration that aimed to transform its pet insurance claims management.
Miles Thorson, Co-Founder and CEO at Odie, highlighted the importance of this partnership: “Teaming up with Five Sigma is a natural fit for our vision to elevate our customer experience. With Five Sigma, we are able to automate many processes and utilize the latest AI advancements for useful recommendations, without losing the reassuring human touch that our claims teams bring to our members.”
“We’re thrilled to support Odie in reshaping pet insurance claims. At Five Sigma, we believe that agility and scalability are key to meeting the diverse needs of specialty insurers. By delivering a platform that’s designed for flexibility, we’re empowering Odie to provide a customer-centric claims experience that is structured exactly as they want it given their expertise in pet insurance, and that grows with their business effortlessly.” Said Oded Barak, Co-founder and CEO of Five Sigma.
Odie Automates for Success
Five Sigma’s advanced technology seamlessly integrated with Odie’s digital platform, supporting its mission to provide accessible, streamlined, and modern customer service.
This integration allowed Odie to automate many of its time-consuming manual processes, like First Notice of Loss (FNOL) population, reserve setting, and document summaries.
Odie allows policyholders to choose from various reimbursement rates, deductible amounts, and annual limits, enabling tailored coverage for pet owners. Five Sigma’s claims management platform easily calculates reserves and coverage amounts based on the pet owner’s specific policy on Odie’s digital platform.
The implementation process also included quick and easy onboarding of staff members, thanks to the easy and intuitive interface of Five Sigma’s claims management platform.
April Heasley, Chief Experience Officer at Odie, highlighted the impact of the collaboration, noting that “the support and service we’ve received from the Five Sigma team have been unparalleled, and played an instrumental role in our success. Five Sigma’s attentiveness and commitment have made the transition smooth and effortless.”
Odie Reaping the Benefits and Claims a Victory in Efficiency
Since the integration of Five Sigma’s platform, Odie has seen notable improvements across its claims management operations:
- Reduced Cycle Times: Together with Five Sigma’s payment processing structure, Odie was able to implement an ACH payment solution that ultimately reduced reimbursement time by almost 75%. Additionally, Odie expects to see a 20% minimum decrease in claims processing time by early 2025.
- Configurability – Quick no-code setting on the Five Sigma platform of various claims categories and subcategories enables Odie to implement their customized workflows with no downtime or requirements from IT or Five Sigma.
- Automation: With Five Sigma’s advanced automation, Odie sets up claims at FNOL automatically. Claims are adjudicated with minimal manual input, ensuring faster resolution times and fewer errors. This allows Odie’s team to handle a larger volume of claims as the business grows without sacrificing quality and enables a focus on customer service in complex cases.
- Optimal communications: Five Sigma’s platform offers a centralized communication hub where all communications with policyholders (pet owners) and vendors are recorded and summarized – whether via email or phone call. The centralized claims communication has streamlined Odie’s interactions with pet owners and veterinary professionals, simplifying decision-making and enhancing the overall customer experience.
- Data-Driven Insights: With access to real-time and historical claims data, along with AI-driven actionable recommendations, Odie’s claims team can make better, more informed decisions on coverage and settlement, improving claims outcomes for the company and policyholders.
- Operational Efficiency and Accuracy: Five Sigma’s system has built-in safeguards that ensure accurate claims processing, a reduction in overall loss, streamlined auto-denials, and the separation of complex and simple claims.
Chasing Innovation: Odie and Five Sigma’s Next Steps
As two Insurtech innovators, Odie and Five Sigma are always looking for the next technological advancement to transform pet insurance and claims management.
In July 2023, Five Sigma launched Clive™, the insurance industry’s first AI Claims Adjuster. Clive helps claims teams improve productivity by AI analysis that improves decision-making and also by automating many more manual tasks that used to take significant time.
Odie is currently experimenting with Clive for automatic vet invoice processing, extracting data, automatically populating fields in the claims management platform, and analyzing the implications for coverage and payouts.
Want to reap the benefits of advanced AI? Get Five Sigma for your claims operations!
About Odie
Odie Pet Insurance is a national pet health insurance brand founded with a revolutionary spirit and caregiving goal to provide all dog and cat owners access to essential pet care services through a centralized digital hub. Leveraging its technology-enabled platform, Odie simplifies access to vital pet care services for strategic partners – expanding reach, revenue streams, and product portfolios.
For more information, visit Odie’s website.
