TellUs: Rebuilding how 600k+ customers a year report a claim

In short

The old claims intake solution was a chat, and it had been on everyone’s mind for a long time. It was harder to use than it should have been, and it left real user problems unsolved.

TellUs replaced it with a conversational form. It guides people through their claim in plain language, shows where they are, saves their draft, and points to the exact question when something is missing. Today it runs for 600k+ customers a year, customers are happier with how reporting a claim works, and more teams across If keep adopting it.

Goal

Customers report a claim on their own, without guessing, and find it easier than before.

Success metrics

Customer satisfaction with reporting a claim
Completion rate
Drop-off by step
Time to report a claim
Share of claims reported online
Teams and countries adopting it
Partner sites using the forms

My role

I was both the product designer and the product owner of TellUs: discovery, design, backlog, priorities, and the conversations about what not to build.

The team was spread across the Nordics and the Baltics, so a lot of my work was keeping everyone on the same problem.

Decisions that shaped it

A conversation, not a form

People report claims on a bad day. Instead of facing a long form, they’re guided through what happened in plain language, the way a good claims handler would ask.

Ask only what the claim needs

Every question in a claim is personal data, sometimes about someone’s health. Together with the business developers who build each country’s claim forms, every question is carefully crafted to support both the customer and the business, and nothing is asked that the claim doesn’t need.

Accessible and on-brand by default

TellUs is built to WCAG 2.1 level AA, the accessibility level our Nordic markets require, and follows If’s design system on any screen. That’s why other teams could pick it up without a redesign.

TellUs on desktop: the injured person’s contact details, with a progress list down the side — A progress list shows where you are and what’s left.

TellUs: questions about injuries and treatment — Injuries and treatment, asked in plain language.

TellUs: salary during sick leave — Salary on sick leave, with the reason explained right where it’s asked.

TellUs: review of the reporter’s details and attachments — Everything can be checked and edited before sending.

TellUs: claim submitted — Claim submitted, and what happens next.

TellUs on three phones: a saved draft, an error summary and a feedback screen — On mobile: a saved draft, errors that link to the exact question, and feedback at the end.

One form, any brand

Colours, type and components live in one Figma library, and the code uses the same design tokens. Teams build new forms from ready-made components and styles instead of starting from scratch, and every form stays consistent and accessible by default.

The tokens also make theming easy. Partners who sell our insurance get the same forms on their own sites, in their own branding: we change the theme, not the form.

The same TellUs form on phones in several partner brands — One form, in each partner’s brand.

Image: assets/img/tellus/component_library.webp

The component library: colours, type and components, shared by design and code.

How we got there

Feedback analysis and interviews with users and stakeholders gave us six personas. Then we sketched together, because a room full of people with markers beats one designer alone.

Design reviews can get boring, so I sometimes run them with de Bono’s six thinking hats. Everyone wears one hat at a time, so the black hat can be as grumpy as it likes without taking over the meeting.

User test findings went to stakeholders as evidence, not opinions, and most of our decisions came out of those sessions.

High-level claim journey map — The first map of the claim journey. Messy on purpose.

Six personas, from a family in Finland to a claims handler — Six personas from interviews and feedback analysis.

Photos from an on-site workshop, with walls of sticky notes — Workshop day on site.

Workshop board with a warm-up, sketches and a press conference exercise — The workshop board: warm-up, sketches and a press conference exercise.

Sketches from a team sketching session — Co-sketching with the team. More ideas, fewer egos.

Research board with other conversational forms — How others do conversational forms, inside and outside insurance.

The first TellUs designs on desktop — The first designs on desktop.

Prioritisation matrix with sticky notes — Deciding what to build first.

User test analysis board, task by task — Test findings, task by task, ready to share with stakeholders.

Six thinking hats design review board — A six thinking hats design review.

Early mobile screens of TellUs — Early mobile screens.

Result

600k+ customers a year, happier customers when they report a claim, and adoption still growing across the company. The same forms can run on partner sites, in their own brands.

TellUs on phone, tablet and laptop screens — One form for every screen.

Looking back

It was a bumpy road, and it’s still the project I’m most proud of. Claim forms are complex: every answer changes the questions that follow, and people fill them in on a bad day. Getting them right meant understanding how people really use a product, not how we hoped they would. Complex, challenging and very rewarding.

What kept us going was the person on the other side. Someone reporting a claim after an accident should feel guided, not interrogated, and every round of testing brought the form a little closer to that.