ePremium | Working with Gold Standards | Lori Murphy

IRIS achieves 100% compliance with the insurance lease requirement by automatically placing coverage for non-compliant residents. Furthermore, the ePremium team validates third-party insurance for residents to ensure compliance. Ultimately, this frees up leasing staff from the burden of handling and administering renters’ insurance tracking and insurance lease requirements.

The company has prioritized security throughout the design and implementation of our systems. “We prioritize security as a design consideration when developing and implementing new systems and applications. We are PCI compliant and have policies to regularly monitor our environment to reduce the risk of attack,” says Lori Murphy, the current President & Chief Experience Officer at ePremium. “Further we provide regular training to our employees on security best practices and conduct awareness programs to keep our company cyber safe.”

Driving Development

ePremium’s goal has always been to make the workload lighter for the property management teams through their technology platform, IRIS, which offers a first-to-market tracking and monitoring tool. They then created many integrations with the primary Property Management Solutions in the multi-family space.

Most recently, after the Pandemic, the company saw a fundamental change in how the property management teams returned to work. In most cases, fewer staff members were replaced due to budgetary constraints and the ‘great resignation’ when employees chose to stay home. The problem for the client partners was the workload remained the same.

To solve this, ePremium built upon its already successful IRIS platform to enhance the tracking and monitor capabilities to fully validate all third-party policies at lease signing and all renewals. This enhancement allows the resident to bypass the leasing team regarding presenting their insurance proof of coverage, as ePremium now takes on that heavy lifting. To further show confidence in this enhancement, ePremium offered the client partners an added safety net as an “automatic coverage endorsement.” This endorsement and the new validation process afforded time back to the site teams to focus on running the property while mitigating the risk with no effort from the site teams. “As you can imagine, the adoption of this program since inception has been phenomenal and we anticipate this will be the standard for all new client partners moving forward,” adds Lori.

The company’s next phase in driving strategic growth and streamlining the property management operational workflow is the introduction of ePremium’s deposit alternative program, Deposit Select. Clients are looking for options for replacing traditional cash deposits due to the increasingly stringent and cumbersome laws around taking and holding cash deposits. Their program works as a deposit waiver program for the residents. It is a commercially underwritten program that provides the relief management companies need when reducing the risks, they currently face.

“ePremium prides itself on offering the Gold Standard across the board to our client partners. Whether that is our customer care team that talks directly with the resident, our dedicated account management team that works directly with our client partners, our claims team that strive to streamline and expedite the process, our ongoing enhancements to our IRIS tracking & monitoring platform or even the fact that we have varied programs and product offerings to choose from,” elucidates Lori.

Client Focused for Success

ePremium takes a very consultative approach, working to fully understand what the client partners are looking to solve and then show them the best solution for that issue. They have multiple program options, so they are not pushing them into something that will not ultimately meet their goals or even potentially backfire in 18-24 months. This approach has suited ePremium well over our 15+ year history, and the clients know they can trust and respect them for taking this approach. “We will continue to innovate both products and our technology to meet the ever-changing market conditions,” adds the steadfast leader.

ePremium partnered with a 6,700-unit management company in Southern California to offer its Renters Insurance to their residents and purchased their Tenant Legal Liability (TLL) policy to cover units if the resident let their Renters Insurance lapse. The unknown cancellation of required Renters Insurance policies had been a persistent issue for this client resulting in what should have been covered losses having to be submitted to their commercial carrier or paid for from the budget. ePremium’s insurance tracking software allowed the client to monitor the status of all the renters’ Insurance across their portfolio, and 49 months after rollout, their carrier paid a total loss claim exceeding $100,000 because of a fire caused by a resident who had let their Renters Insurance lapse and for which ePremium’s software automatically added the unit for coverage by the client’s TLL policy. This is the value proposition for all ePremium clients as all have been paid claims from the ePremium Renters Insurance policies and their associated TLL policies.

“A particular challenge we face with all our clients is ensuring our partner Leasing Teams understand how to discuss the insurance requirements of the lease while presenting ePremium as their recommended provider,” explains Lori. “The strict licensing regulations make it a high priority to instruct them properly as to what can and cannot be spoken about. We go the extra mile to help provide them accurate, easy to understand materials to help their residents understand their choices.”

ePremium already has a national presence and is now looking at a more integrated bundling of its renters and deposit programs, additional integrations with lead-to-lease providers, a Rent Guarantee offering, and widening its scope of distribution to affinity partnerships like insurance companies, Insuretech operators, and other groups with similar customer traits.

“In a recent employee engagement survey, we were selected as one of the Top Places to Work in the greater Cincinnati area,” says Lori. “Many of the comments referenced the “family” atmosphere, how helpful and friendly the team is, and the fact that we are a dynamic, growing company. It’s that energy that has made us a great partner for our clients.”