Insurance agents, brokers and insurers met in Casablanca on October 8 for the 10th annual meeting of the National Federation of Insurance Agents and Brokers in Morocco (FNACAM), where they debated the impact of artificial intelligence (AI) on insurance intermediation.
Beyond adopting new tools, the sector faces two key questions: how to free up more time for customer advice and how to better remunerate that service.
“As intermediaries, we must have the humility to question ourselves before it is too late,” FNACAM President Farid Bensaid said as he opened the meeting, held under the theme “Reinventing Intermediation in the Face of Tomorrow’s Risks.”
Bensaid was direct about AI. It can be used “intelligently as a working tool,” he said, but it also poses “a risk to repetitive tasks which, we must say clearly, will disappear in favor of machines.” His conclusion was clear: “We must prepare to use AI as a working tool.”
For Bachir Baddou, deputy vice president of the Moroccan Insurance Federation (FMA) and CEO of CAT Assurance et Réassurance, the main risk is the arrival of a new player between the intermediary and the customer.
“The greatest risk you will face is that you will have a customer, an AI, an insurance intermediary and an insurance company,” he warned. Younger consumers are already asking Claude, Gemini or ChatGPT which coverage they should take out before approaching an insurer, he said.
Stéphane Favaretto, co-founder and CEO of Minalea, cautioned against this habit. Customers who turn to AI for insurance advice “cultivate the illusion of receiving a clear answer” and become, in his words, “confident pseudo-experts.” This is where intermediaries retain their value, he argued, because AI provides information, not advice.
“Advice […] means telling the customer what their policy should include to properly cover their needs,” Favaretto said.
“An agent’s biggest competitor is an agent who uses AI”
Baddou dismissed the idea that the profession would disappear, but warned that competition would increasingly come from within the industry.
“An agent’s or broker’s biggest competitor is an agent or broker who uses AI,” he said.
Providing advice requires time, much of which is currently taken up by administrative work. Gilles Fromageot, CEO of AXA Afrique Transatlantique, acknowledged that “there is still far too much administrative work, particularly in Morocco.” This takes time away from prospecting for new customers and following up with existing ones.
Hamid Mosleh, president of FNACAM’s northern regional section, described the daily reality for insurance agencies. “In Morocco, we talk a lot about digitalization, but […] we are drowning in paperwork because, by law, contracts must be signed by hand.”
Baddou also acknowledged that insurance companies must “transform themselves” to address the sector’s “bureaucracy.”
Some changes are already underway. FMA President Mohamed Hassan Bensalah cited two examples. A QR code-based motor insurance certificate has been in a pilot phase since July 1, with the removal of the physical document targeted for July 1, 2027. Multichannel payment options are also being gradually rolled out across insurance companies.
“Time saved must become time spent with customers and on business development. That, in my view, is what the intermediary of tomorrow should look like,” Bensalah said.
Favaretto sees AI as a break from previous waves of digital technology. Earlier tools had not freed up agents’ time for customer relations, he said, whereas AI now has that potential.
“The only important measure for an agent or broker is how much time they spend with their customers each week,” he said.
Rethinking the business model
The transformation also raises questions about profitability. “The advice we provide is free,” Mosleh said. Intermediaries face growing obligations, but their remuneration has not evolved accordingly.
He called for a more balanced partnership with insurance companies, arguing that advice and prevention help reduce claims. Intermediaries, he said, should receive a share of the savings generated by lower compensation costs.
Philippe Rocard, a consultant and lecturer, addressed demands for changes to commission rates, which have remained unchanged in Morocco for years. In other countries, he explained, commission rates tend to fall, but the reduction is offset by remuneration based on other criteria, such as the technical quality of an insurance portfolio or the number of different policies held by a customer.
The cost of AI tools themselves is another concern that has yet to be fully anticipated. “Everyone thinks AI is free, and more or less it is, but tomorrow it will not be,” warned Patrick Raffort, founding president of the Federation of Affinity Insurance and Guarantees (FG2A). He said these costs could put many businesses under pressure.
Despite these changes, speakers stressed that human relationships remain central to insurance. “Let us not make the mistake of thinking that technology will replace trust,” Bensalah said.
The challenge for intermediaries is to answer a question raised by Mahaman Nasser Yahaya, CEO of ARIA Benin, the meeting’s guest of honor, which customers may increasingly ask them: “What do you do for me between renewals?”
