PhonePe Adds Health To Its Insurance Portfolio Offerings

PhonePe Insurance Brokering Services, the wholly-owned subsidiary of the Walmart-owned fintech decacorn PhonePe, has launched its health insurance vertical, offering plans in partnership with multiple insurers.

Integrating health insurance into its suite of financial products, PhonePe said the users can set up monthly payments for the premium via its UPI platform. The fintech claims that it has sold 5.6 Mn policies to date, and is diversifying its insurance products with health insurance.

The health insurance plans, which come with coverage of up to INR 1 Cr, allow users to choose any hospital room without any cap. A user can also avail of a bonus cover of up to 7 times of the base cover amount for each claim-free year, among other features.

Users can buy health insurance on the PhonePe app by entering the details of the members they want to insure, comparing policies on the quotes page, entering health details and either setting up a monthly mandate or paying annually. 

The fintech said that the health insurance plans are accompanied by pre and post-sales assistance to help users make informed decisions, file claims and access other services.

Commenting on the launch, Hemant Gala, VP of financial services at PhonePe said, “One of the biggest barriers in buying health insurance has been affordability and we have solved the same by creating India’s first health insurance marketplace focused on monthly payments.” 

Gala added that the company believes the product would drive deep penetration with users being able to pay in monthly subscriptions with a lower financial burden.

PhonePe, founded in December 2015 by Sameer Nigam, Rahul Chari and Burzin Engineer, claims to have more than 400 Mn registered users. The app is the largest UPI app in India by user base and market share, as it processed 446.14 Cr UPI transactions worth INR 7.46 Lakh Cr in June 2023.

The fintech decacorn, which has raised $850 Mn so far in 2023, accounted for 47.79% of UPI transactions by volume and 50.53% of UPI transactions by value.

The Walmart-owned fintech giant has been on a product launch spree over the past few months, having launched Account Aggregator (AA) services, a payment gateway, a merchant lending marketplace, a point-of-sale (PoS) device and UPI Lite since May.