How many times have you received an insurance application from one of your clients that’s ready to take to the market on the first attempt? The answer is probably not very often.

The amount of complicated questions that the insured must complete within the application usually means that applications are not complete at the first time of asking. Then, the agent must send the application back to the insured for corrections, delaying the time it takes the agency to send the application to the carrier and receive a quote.

This happens a lot. The sheer amount of information on the average insurance form can easily cause the insured to overlook or skip applicable questions or become confused about irrelevant questions leaving them unsure which sections to fill out. Then, they contact the agency via phone or email to find the answers—another time-consuming, tedious process for both parties.

There’s a better solution: Smart forms. Take your applications into the 21st century. Smart forms are digital, automated, interactive and make questions and sections less confusing for the insured, resulting in more complete applications.

Here are three ways smart forms help your clients send you complete applications quickly and easily:

1) Require certain questions. Every agent is simply looking to get the necessary information from the insured so they can go to the market. With smart forms, the agent can mark questions that are a requirement, which means the insured can’t click submit until all required questions are complete, forcing them to fill out all the needed information.

As a result, when the form is submitted to the agent, the chances of it being filled out correctly and ready for the market the first time are high.

2) Hide sections. Prevent your clients from filling out an entire 15-page form when you know only three pages are required. With smart forms, you can hide non-applicable sections or questions. That way, insureds never even see them during the application process.

Eliminating questions also make forms less confusing for the insured. In addition, you don’t have to answer the insured’s questions about sections that aren’t relevant for going to market and the application is completed quickly and correctly.

3) Comments and tips. Confusion is the enemy of an application being completed correctly the first time. However, even the required questions on a form can still be confusing for the insured. For example, should the insured provide in-depth details on a question about business activities or will one word or sentence suffice?

To combat this problem, proactively address certain questions that you know the insured will get stuck on by adding helpful tips and directions. For example, leave a comment on the business activity question and say, “Please provide as much detail as possible.”

This feature makes it easier for the insured to answer questions on their own—the first time. And hopefully, if they do come to a question that would traditionally cause them to stop and call their agent, they already have the right information to continue and complete the application without asking for help.

Reduce the amount of work for the insured and unnecessary interactions with you, the agent. Use smart forms to ensure that the insured can fill out forms quickly, accurately and without having to consistently ask the agent questions about the process.

Stay tuned to your weekly News & Views e-newsletter for more ways to get completed applications back from your clients at the first time of asking.

Ken Wohl is head of marketing at Indio Technologies.