Dealers struggling to shorten F&I wait times may want to look at saving the 15-plus minutes generally needed to verify buyers’ insurance manually.
CheckMyDriver, a new service from Modives, automates the manual insurance verification process and allows it to be completed anywhere in the dealership, not just in the F&I office. Data shared by CheckMyDriver notes that 24% of car buyers report waiting for insurance verification at a dealership as one of the most troublesome tasks in the purchase process.
“CheckMy Driver automatically verifies a customer’s insurance coverage against the information provided to the dealership to check their policy is active, adequate and accurate,” Joel Samen, Modives’ chief marketing officer, tells WardsAuto. “That not only saves time, but it creates a better customer experience.”
When most people think of insurance fraud, they think of staged accidents and exaggerated damages or injuries. Dealers generally face a form of soft fraud in which applicants are knowingly or unknowingly untruthful about coverage.
Although types of soft fraud are not fully categorized, Point Predictive’s 2023 Auto Lending Fraud Report shows $8.1 billion auto fraud losses in 2022 due to synthetic identities.
Another dealership headache can occur when multiple staff members are involved in the insurance verification process. Dealerships can run afoul of the FTC’s Safeguards Rule, which requires customer information to remain confidential. Each violation can carry up to $100,000 in penalties.
One dealership, whose leaders asked for its name to remain confidential, could have faced such a violation when a salesperson made copies of a buyer’s driver’s license and insurance card and put it in the deal jacket. The concern increased that the jacket was left in the sales department, routed to the F&I office and ultimately lost. That meant that customer confidentiality was breached, and the salesperson also had to call the customer and request the same documents, thus undermining confidence.
“When we originally created our value proposition, the easy messages was, 'you’re saving the 15 to 30 minutes, needed for verification,'” Frederick Waite, Modives’ CEO and founder, tells WardsAuto. “But as we talked to more and more dealers, we realized some deals get kicked because of insurance processes.”
One example was when a dealership loaned a customer a new vehicle after manually verifying insurance. The customer’s son took the car for a joy ride, rolled it six times and totaled the vehicle. The dealership discovered the woman did not have active insurance.
The insurance process from Modives ensures that the insurance information is accurate, adequate and active whether the consumer is buying, leasing or borrowing a vehicle from any state.
“From our perspective, this system crosses off every checkbox needed as it relates to providing value and reducing risk,” says Waite, adding that some dealerships must charge higher administrative fees due to the time it takes to verify insurance information. “That means CheckMy Driver cuts down on time wasted verifying insurance, removes compliance liability and creates a better customer experience—a real win-win-win.”
The cost of the service varies depending on subscription and volume.
