[Hidden-tech] Great Use of LLMs for Insurance Policy Scrutiny; Many Hopeful Implications

[Marcia Yudkin]

Rob,

Thanks so much for posting this! I will most certainly look very closely at our own Amica homeowners policy when it is up for renewal in June.

Though I have to say that Amica has been extremely customer-friendly to us in the two times we have had a claim.

Marcia Yudkin / Goshen 






On Sunday, February 2, 2025 at 10:07:51 AM HST, Rob Laporte via Hidden-discuss <hidden-discuss at lists.hidden-tech.net> wrote: 





Hi All,
The following intrigue-laced home insurance drama suggests great uses for LLMs, as well as entrepreneurial vistas.
Insurance Policy Skulduggery
Customized LLM tools like OpenAI GPTs, Google NoteBook LM, and Claude Projects enable brilliant unpacking of insurance policies and their tiny annual text changes that can undermine your coverage and increase risk. Given news about surprise clauses denying or reducing coverage for CA wildfire victims, and given that all, even non-CA, insurance corporations will have to increase rates (due in part to how re-insurance works to insure insurance companies), I thought it wise to use LLMs to scrutinize my formerly trustworthy Amica home and auto policies. 
I uploaded all past and current docs to three top LLMs, and discovered that little word changes meant that my home would not actually be covered. The details are many and important, but I’ll mention just salient issues:
    * Language regarding home office use changed such that, say, a demolishing fire would not be covered, or at best would result in costly court battles to get the coverage one had in prior years. And guess what increased enormously since the pandemic? Home office coverage subdivides by important distinctions too involved to get into here.
    * A little new text about security devices rendered a future claim easily dismissed. The new policy itemizes various wireless security and fire subsystems, inputting some I did not have, which gave a $35 discount. In prior years, none of those devices were listed. ChatGPT explained that this is one of several tricks insurance companies use: If I had not found it, and my home burned down, the insurance company could claim the misrepresentation is a kind of fraud nullifying the contract. And one of the features Amica pre-filled for me was a “Wi-Fi connected fire alarm” I don’t have.
        * Yes, you could fight that in court, but you’d likely have to settle for less than full coverage or else risk losing all at trial. 
    * Other little text changes since last year impacted full replacement costs, personal property coverage, town building ordinance costs during rebuild, and more. All of the changes either reduced coverage or injected ambiguity that corporate insurance lawyers love in denying claims. 
When I called the insurance company rep (and got permission to record as they too record), she claimed that they had not gotten my contact form submission of questions I sent via a linked Google doc. I had gotten a reply that a rep would get back to me--after the renewal and auto-pay date I disabled. While spoke with a rep, I arranged emailing it directly to her, and she claimed she did not get it--while Google showed 6 new live viewers streaming in (the doc was viewable only via that emailed link). After some talk, I pointed out that several people just started looking at the doc right now, prompting the live viewers to drop off one after another like cockroaches when the light goes on. She said she’d have to refer this matter to the local branch who would call me Monday. A long hold early in the conversation--after I explained my LLM use--suggests she had already looped in managers and probably legal, who were not only viewing the doc but also must have been listening live. It seems insurance companies are gearing up for a trend of people using LLMs to scrutinize policies. 
Lesson: LLMs empower us to vet contracts rapidly.
Similar LLM Uses and Related Career Opportunities
One can vet one’s town property taxes. A neighbor into LLMs is currently making a little interactive app which (1) shows how much more or less one’s home tax appraisal went up relative to one’s street or any selected area, and (2) shows the maximum, minimum, and range of increases in a town. This enables detecting errors costing homeowners, and then getting LLM guidance on resolving the issue/s. 
One can quickly assess Terms of Service (ToS) and Privacy Policy changes. I signed up for a crypto IRA ~5 years ago. Subsequently, they had some shady changes in storage and banking custodians. A few months ago, I could not log in to view or act unless I agreed to a new ToS. An LLM highlighted new risks in the new ToS, which were buried in the many pages. Now, after each login that requires clicking agreement, I email and post to customer service that I do not concede to the new terms. (I'll be moving from them soon; and BTW, how screwy is it that a long-term financial contract can be changed at any time?).
Business Opportunity:  An enterprising soul could launch an LLM service that automatically scrutinizes one’s ever changing ToS and Privacy Policies. I recall one scholar’s research showing the typical person would need ~85 days per year to actually read all these shifting terms and policies. I bet people would pay $10+/mo to get alerts and summaries of risks for all the services they easily select for tracking.
Imagine the many ways people with LLM proficiency could launch service businesses that help people and businesses manage vital information.
Broader Implications for We The People
A bright side of LLMs, especially open-source ones that aren’t censored, is that we can verify what officials, agencies, or governments said and when. News is for sale, but now, or very soon, truth is quickly available. There’s a reason that the protagonist Winston in Orwell’s 1984 works in the Ministry of Truth editing current and past news. And there’s a reason the Internet Archive's WayBack Machine, which offers searchable, past date-stamped views of all important websites and pages, was attacked last year by lawfare and heavy DDoS attacks to take it down. 
LLMs could be potent truth machines supporting the informed consent that is the lifeblood of Democracy.
Oh yes, LLMs pose menace too, but let’s not overlook their bright potentials.

Best Regards,

Rob Laporte
CEO  |  R&D Manager
DISC - Making Websites Make Money
Rob at 2disc.com, 413-584-6500
www.2disc.com

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