AER Upgrades Respond Products to Improve Hail Claim Assessments

Atmospheric and Environmental Research (AER), a member of the Verisk Analytics Family of Companies, has upgraded its AER Respond and historical AER Benchmark products. The upgraded service provides a 15 percent improvement in the ability to validate hail claims.

“Until now, the fundamental gap in all radar interpretations of hail has been ground truth,” said Nicole Homeier, senior staff scientist at AER. “We’ve confirmed that insurance claims data, when considered carefully to avoid bias, has proven invaluable to validate radar-based hail data. Insurance claims data can also elevate the state-of-the-art of algorithms that predict the occurrence of claims and the resulting repairs.”

AER leverages aggregated claims data provided by hundreds of property/casualty insurance carriers to Verisk Analytics.

Hail is a foundational peril in AER’s suite of peril-monitoring and database services. The AER Respond analysis and forecasting service comprises hail, wind, rain, lightning, heavy snow, hurricane, tornado, and wildfire perils. AER uses weather content, satellite‐based damage recognition, and insurance claims analysis to provide the industry with this service.