Buying Health Insurance From Bajaj Allianz Health Insurance? | A Review
Bajaj Allianz General Insurance Company Limited is a joint venture between Bajaj Finserv Limited and Allianz SE, the world’s leading insurer. Bajaj Allianz offers a wide range of products and services that cater to individuals across demographics of the country and the corporate sector.
They’ve mentioned on their website that their main aim is to be customer-centric and provide the best customer experience at every touchpoint. They also aim to make insurance a pull rather than a push product.
Through a mystery shopping audit, our Research Team went through a health insurance customer’s actual journey on the Bajaj Allianz website and verified their ‘customer-centric' approach.
How was the experience? We find out in this edition of Beshak Test Drive: Bajaj Allianz Health Insurance Review.
User-friendly website 👍
Bajaj Allianz’s website is well-designed and easy to navigate. The website interface is very smooth and user-friendly. We did not face any difficulty while searching for products or their details on the website.
Placement of products 👍
After you fill in some basic details like your name, mobile number, sum insured, the type of health cover you want to opt for, etc., you’ll be recommended Bajaj Allianz health insurance plans. All the products are well-arranged, and most details of the products are available on the website itself.
Policy wordings and brochures 👍
The policy wordings and brochures of all the Bajaj Allianz health insurance plans are available on the same page where the product and other details are mentioned.
Payment experience 👍
Our entire payment experience with Bajaj Allianz was pretty smooth. The payment got completed over a single call, and we did not face any issues. A few insurers ask you to fill a short, simple form before payment, and a lengthy, complex form after payment. At Bajaj Allianz Health Insurance, however, we were asked to fill only one form - and that was before payment.
Quick policy issuance 👍
As soon as we completed the payment on Bajaj Allianz’s website, the policy got activated. The policy papers were delivered to our inbox right after that.
Purchase experience 👎
The advisor who got on a call with us did not have enough knowledge about the products listed on the Bajaj Allianz website. He seemed a bit confused and couldn’t explain the product features, benefits, and other processes to us. The call was later transferred to a senior advisor, who gave us a brief about the products, their features, riders, Bajaj Health Insurance renewal process, etc. He also explained both cashless and reimbursement claim processes and the documents needed during both processes.
Post-purchase experience 👎
Our post-purchase experience was not good either. The advisor and the company’s agents did not pick up our calls or respond to emails, and we had to follow up multiple times to get our queries resolved.
Unsolicited calls 👎
Spamming and chasing are common in the insurance sector. At Bajaj Allianz, too, we received multiple calls from the agents asking us to purchase a policy from them. In fact, we received 4-5 unsolicited calls right after the policy was issued to us.
Some details missing from the website 👎
Details about the free look period and riders are not available on the website. You’ll have to check the policy wordings or the brochure if you want to learn about the free look period or riders you can choose with a policy. This is one important thing you should know if you are planning to purchase a Bajaj Allianz health insurance plan.
Payment options 👎
Only EMI on credit cards and annual payment options are available with Bajaj Allianz. Quarterly and half-annual payment options are not available. And in case you don’t have an active credit card, you’ll have no option but to choose the annual payment option.
E-insurance/ Demat account 👎
After we received the policy papers, we contacted the advisor and asked him about the e-insurance account. He, however, did not have adequate knowledge about it and told us an e-insurance account was not required.
Cancellation 👎
When the advisor was explaining the policy and other details to us in the beginning, we had asked him about the cancellation process and the documents that would be needed. He had clearly mentioned we would just need to drop an email for cancellation - and no cancellation cheque would be required.
When we emailed Bajaj Allianz requesting cancellation, they asked us to state the reason for cancellation, which we did. Then, the advisor told us they would process our refund within 7 to 14 days. After a week, when we tried to contact the advisor to know the status of our cancellation, he did not respond to our calls or emails.
1 to 2 days later, we contacted the company’s customer care who told us they did not receive any cancellation request from our side. We tried to inform the agent that we had already emailed them, but he did not pay any heed and asked us to send a cancellation email again. So, we had to raise a cancellation request again and after a lot of hassles and endless follow-ups, our policy was finally cancelled.
Refund 👎
After we raised the cancellation request the second time, we inquired about the refund too. The agent who was on the call told us they would deduct a certain amount and then process our refund. We hadn’t been informed about the deduction earlier.
Further, the agent also told us to submit a cancellation cheque and proof of identity. He started arguing with us when we told him we wouldn't be submitting these documents because, at the time of policy purchase, one of their advisors had clearly mentioned no documents would be required.
The agent was not ready to listen. So, we escalated the issue and emailed a senior official from the company. After some time, we received a call from one of their agents who told us no document submission would be needed, but they would deduct a small percentage from the refund amount because of the delay.
We tried to make the agent understand that the delay was from their end, but he turned a deaf ear. And even after all these difficulties, we still had to follow up a lot of times to get the refund amount.
Some aspects we really liked while purchasing from Bajaj Allianz -
- The website interface was seamless and user-friendly.
- All the products were arranged systematically.
- Our payment got completed over a single call.
- The policy was issued to us quickly, right after we made the payment.
Some things we did not like -
- The first advisor who got in touch with us did not have proper knowledge about the products.
- Some details related to the products are missing from the website.
- We received a lot of unsolicited calls from the company.
- After payment, the advisor and the agents did not respond to our calls and emails.
- We had to go through a lot of difficulties to cancel the policy and get our refund.
The insurance company needs to improve and work on a lot of areas if it really wants to fulfil its promise of offering the best experience at every touchpoint to customers.
If you liked this Beshak Test Drive: Bajaj Allianz Health Insurance Review, do let us know in the comments below.
Have a question about insurance? Post it on the Beshak Insurance Forum and get responses from insurance experts!
We are a group of young members of the Beshak community. We come together to brainstorm, write relevant and useful content for people (just like us) who want to figure insurance on their own. If you too want to share inputs/write for us - send us a "hey" to info@beshak.org