SafeShare Insurance Broking was a live product used for an insurance client, Vrumi.
Vrumi connects professionals needing work space with householders who have rooms, through an online marketplace. Vrumi have partnered with SafeShare Global, a pioneering start-up insurance business focusing on the sharing economy, to develop the first fully integrated insurance product to give home owners 100% peace of mind.
The insurance product employs a distributed ledger - aka blockchain technology - created by Z/Yen Group to confirm counter-party obligations. Blockchain technology facilitates the delivery of a flexible and a responsive product to customers at a reasonable price.
Roddy Campbell, Vrumi's co-founder has highlighted that "insurance is the biggest practical problem" facing the expansion of the sharing economy. In practical terms, most traditional home insurance policies exclude paying guests. This renders those policies void should any issues occur.
The product is underwritten at Lloyd's of London. It offers hosts the opportunity to 'opt in' to cover, giving comfort without breaking the bank. With a modest excess and a 24-hour claim service hotline, this insurance will help increase confidence in generating extra income for UK home owners. The underlying replicated authoritative immutable ledger ensures a trusted record of insured parties is maintained.
Alex Steinart, SafeShare Global Co-Founder states:
"Insurance for the sharing economy needs to be flexible and responsive to customer needs. Our distributed ledger approach, developed by Z/Yen Group, offers the opportunity to coordinate the provision of products between counter-parties in near real-time and to radically cut the cost of this coordination."
Professor Michael Mainelli, Executive Chairman of Z/Yen, continues:
"Z/Yen's woven broadcast technology delivers SafeShare's insurance solution an undisputable record of the insured through a distributed network of proof. Built on MetroGnomo, encrypted copies of the distributed ledger are held by all parties, such as the States of Alderney who are providing oversight of MetroGnomo's integrity."
Though SafeShare won awards, ultimately the sharing economy insurance requirements did not reach scale and SafeShare has been 'mothballed'.
The process was
Challenge:
Party 1: Uploads a document to party 2’s database using a log in
Party 2: Runs MetroGnomo Receiver, saves ledger
Party 1: Hash Document
Party 1: Timestamp Hash using API
Party 1: Log in (as if it was a portal) where username = MetroID & Password = 'whatever'
Party 1: Send document to central database accompanied with UUID, Document Type (e.g. Bordereaux)
Party 2: Will add entry to the SafeShare database if the MetroGnomo ledger entry with the given UUID exists, and if the tag includes the filehash that maps to the document uploaded.
Party 2: Add to the Database entry the Policy Holder => Maps directly to the MetroGnomoID