SPH, NTUC Income and MetLife's LumenLab tap on blockchain to automate insurance claims

The pilot trial will launch in June and target 1,000 random policyholders.

Singapore Press Holdings (SPH), NTUC Income (Income) and LumenLab, MetLife’s Asia innovation centre, are applying blockchain technology called Lifechain to automate the life insurance claims process for bereaved families.

Developed by LumenLab, Lifechain enables SPH to securely encrypt and share verification data used for obituary placement with Income to kick-start the claims process. Lifechain will begin piloting this month by targeting 1,000 randomly selected Income life insurance policyholders.

During the pilot, family members of the deceased who place obituaries in The Straits Times will be informed about Lifechain. Upon their consent, the deceased’s National Registration Identity Card (NRIC) number will be submitted into Lifechain as hashed data to trigger a search for a matching life insurance policy.

When a match is found, SPH will inform family members within one working day, whilst Lifechain will send an automatic notification to Income via email to initiate the claims process.

Family members will also be informed by SPH when a match is not found so that they can proceed to make checks and file claims with their life insurers accordingly.

Julian Tan, chief of digital business of SPH, said, “SPH hopes to expand ‘Lifechain’ to include more insurers in time to come to bring greater convenience to family members attending to the deceased’s administrative matters securely. SPH aims to be the go-to partner for insurers to reach policyholders’ beneficiaries, as soon as advertisers place an obituary in the future.”