Now buy your car, bike insurance on Flipkart as company deepens presence in insurance segment

After life and Covid-19 health insurances, Walmart-owned Flipkart is now offering car and two-wheeler insurance policies to customers. The company has partnered with general insurance firm Bajaj Allianz General Insurance to provide motor insurance tapping into the “vehicle-owners constantly worry about their vehicle health and functionality,” the company said on Tuesday. Flipkart had earlier partnered with Aegon Life Insurance for life insurance and ICICI Lombard and Go Digit General Insurance for Covid-19 insurance policies.

The under penetration of the insurance market in India has opened up opportunities for horizontal marketplaces like Flipkart to cater to its vast consumer base. As per Statista, the overall penetration of insurance industry in India was just 3.7 per cent in 2018 wherein life insurance segment’s penetration was around 2.74 per cent even as for non-life insurance space, the market penetration was lower at 0.97 per cent. The general insurance penetration in India from FY09 to FY19 grew from paltry 0.6 per cent to 0.9 per cent compared to the global average of 2.8 per cent.

“With a strong foothold in understanding Indian consumers, over the course of the last few months, Flipkart has branched out to various insurance services for life, health and devices,” said Ranjith Boyanapalli, Head – Fintech and Payments Group, Flipkart. Importantly, Walmart’s fintech business PhonePe in India also provides insurance services. The company had partnered with Bajaj Allianz to provide travel insurance and had recently launched Covid insurance policy Corona Care.

“In addition to the mobile insurance” offering motor insurance on Flipkart will help Bajaj Allianz “increase our distribution base on this new-age platform,” said Tapan Singhel, Managing Director & Chief Executive Officer, Bajaj Allianz General Insurance.

Meanwhile, Flipkart and Amazon have resumed taking orders from customers based in the red zone as well following the government’s order last week lifting the suspension on most of the services. The marketplaces were delivering goods in orange and green zones since earlier this month after 40 days of complete lockdown across India enforced to curb Covid-19 spread.

Source: Financial Express