Since the first cars were sold, there have been crashes.

And while the insurance claims industry has made enormous advances over the years, the fundamental process of handling a claim has been largely the same for decades at least during my time in this industry, which spans nearly 30 years, and includes research and work in claims and the application of “black box” information in the evaluation of liability and injury causation.

A crash occurs. At some point later, the insured or claimant calls an insurer's first notice of loss department. Collected facts about the accident are used to make initial assignments for vehicle inspection and claim handling. For both auto physical damage (APD) and casualty claims, a variety of steps follow to set appropriate reserves, investigate the claim, monitor the restitution processes and settle the claim. And throughout these steps, speed, accuracy and customer satisfaction are the gold standards for performance.