The quarantine season is here with us, and most of us are still working and therefore driving to work across counties or internally in Nairobi. Apart from traveling, a good number of Kenyans are still buying expensive devices as gifts for their loved ones.

Quick access

To protect ourselves and our property during this quarantine and self-distancing era, Cover app, a new insuretech start-up has launched promising the fastest sign up process for an insurance cover and the quickest claim payments for its customers.

Cover app is giving users quick access to motor, home and travel insurance on the go without having to go from office to office chasing for a cover or a claim. Cover app aims to make the customer on boarding process easier in an industry where both the insurance agents and customers find it cumbersome and tedious.

Now available for free on the Google Play Store, the app currently features the Home Cover allowing users to protect their home valuables for as little as 100 bob per month; a Third Party Cover for vehicles at a cost of KES 1,500; a Travel Cover allowing customers to insure themselves against accidents and loss or damage to their properties and lastly a Comprehensive Motor Cover for their vehicles. There is also a Motor Assistance Cover in case of an emergency or car breakdown.

How it works

To give you a brief overview of how the app works, we headed to the Google Play to quickly download the app and registered for an account. To register, you will provide your names, phone number, ID number, email address and a secret password.

After we cued the details in, the app send a verification SMS and our details were verified automatically and our account registered.

On the app’s left side, there is a menu of what the app contains. It has My Profile, My Wallet, Covers, Settings and About. Covers list the insurance products one can pick from. At the moment, the app has four covers, our brief breakdown is below.

There is a Home Cover which allows customers to insure their wares from as low as Ksh 100 per month. Then there is the Third Party Cover which is a one month emergency third party insurance cover starting at as low as Ksh 1,500. The app also has a section for the Travel Cover which is insurance for yourself against accidents and damage to your property. There is also Motoring Assistance which gives users access to motor assistance suppliers such as AA Membership and lastly we have the Comprehensive Motor Cover which is an annual comprehensive cover for your motor vehicle.

As low as Ksh 100 per month.

After signing up, you can go ahead and load your wallet via MPESA, add and manage your assets or items, view your various covers, report a claim and view your transaction activities such as purchases and top ups in the app.

To test drive the app, we headed straight ahead to MPESA Direct, which is automatic and only requires you to cue in the amount you want to pay, your secret M-PESA and you will be set.

We picked the Home Cover which has three packages. The White package, the Yellow and the Red Package. The White Package starts at Ksh 100 for a maximum cover of up to Ksh 50,000. Yellow starts at Ksh 350 for a cover of up to Ksh 150,000 and Red starts at 950 monthly for a cover of up to 450,000.

Home Cover

With already Ksh 100 send into the Wallet, we selected the White Cover, updated our user profile in the app then headed straight to add the items we wanted to insure in the asset categories. The Home Cover has electronics, furniture and appliances. Electronics cover a phone, tablet, laptop, TV, music system and home theatre. The furniture category covers sofa sets, dining sets, carpets, beds, curtain and TV units while the appliances category covers the fridge, microwave and washing machine.

To cover your phone, you will need to take a photo of it and list its name, description of its features and its serial number. Then save. You can add as many items as possible as long as you have them in the house.

After adding your assets, you head to your cover and select the payment plan i.e monthly or annually. Signing up and getting a cover took around 3 minutes because we had to go around the office taking photos of our furniture. It should take less than 2 minutes if you have the photos of your item(s) already.

The claim process is also simple. You take photos of the incident, upload them into the app and you are done unlike the conventional process where you have to chase insurance agents or wake them up from sleep and bribe a cop to get your incident recorded.

Speaking to TechMoran, Jeremiah Siage, Co-founder and CEO CoverApp said the Insurance industry is a mixed bag of goodies with some firms doing well while others. This is due to the low insurance penetration rate compared to the ratio of the population and GDP.

Siage says CoverApp is set to make the industry better and get more people covered by getting Kenyans to understand insurance, making the onboarding process simple and fast and making the claims experience and process simple and fast.

“Though technology has greatly revived other industries, Insurance has only benefited internally but not as much as banking, saving, lending. Insurance is missing from the list,” he told TechMoran. “We decided to get a product that will give users a wholesome experience, digital first, including the claims. We have digitized the whole process and are getting people who haven’t gotten into insurance to get covers on the go.”

Ann Kamau, Co-founder Cover agrees to Siage’s remarks. “We are opening up insurance to the masses, the entire spectrum including workers and street vendors and not for the high end market alone. Insurance doesn’t have to be for the rich,” she said.

Cover is democratising insurance, making masses know that insurance is not a costly affair for the elite in the society. Cover takes insurance to the masses-both those working for top blue chip corporations or NGOs and the government and those in the bottom of the pyramid.

As the festive season jets in, users are encouraged to take all forms of insurance to protect their property at home, their cars on the road and their luggage or their health as they travel. The Home Cover can be helpful to help protect items at home in the city or upcountry. Users can insure their items from theft or other risks like flooding, fire among others. For those traveling, the Travel Cover protects both you financially, legally and medically and your luggage against loss or damage.