PhonePe seeks to increase user base with new insurance and mutual funds products

Digital payments platform PhonePe is expanding its financial services to include insurance and mutual funds products. The Flipkart payments solutions company has added six new products, a statement said.

Having tied up with leading players in the insurance and mutual funds sectors, PhonePe is now offering their services on its platform, making it a one-stop shop for a range of financial products and services.

The six new products available on PhonePe are

Personal Accident insurance policy: Launched in July, it offers the insured or their nominees a fixed, lump sum amount in the event of death or total permanent disability caused by an accident. The annual premium amount starts from Rs 24 to Rs 480 for the sum insured ranging from Rs 1 lakh to Rs 20 lakh.

Dengue and Malaria cover: Also launched in July, the policy offers policyholders a fixed cash payout amount on diagnosis and more than 48 hours of hospitalisation due to six vector borne diseases including dengue, malaria, Japanese encephalitis, kala-azar, chikungunya and filariasis.

Hospital Daily Cash: Launched in July, this insurance product offers a per day cash payout for between 48 hours and 15 days of hospitalisation, with the cash payable from the second day onwards. With annual premiums starting at Rs 130, with the maximum sum insured capped at Rs 75,000, this is a product that seems meant to cover expenses that are not covered by a health insurance that takes care of medical expenses.

Coronavirus Insurance Policy: This policy was launched as early as April when coronavirus cases started soaring in India. The policy offers cashless as well as reimbursement payouts for diagnosis and hospitalisation due to Covid-19 up to a maximum amount of Rs 1 lakh. The annual premium starts at Rs 396.

Domestic Travel Insurance: Launched in June, this policy offers an annual insurance cover of up to Rs 5 lakh to compensate you for any travel-related losses such as cancellation of flights, loss of baggage and so on, for an annual premium of Rs 499.

Super Funds: Launched in May, this investment solution managed by professional fund managers that invests across multiple top equity, gold and debt funds of various mutual fund companies to help investors create long-term wealth in a safer way. You can begin investing with as little as Rs 500 per month.

“These partners come with deep experience in this space, and have worked very closely with PhonePe to launch tailor-made offerings for its rapidly increasing customer base,” the PhonePe statement said.

PhonePe already has many as 230 million users. The app is typically used to send and receive money, recharge mobile, DTH and data cards, make payments at stores and pay utility bills. It later expanded its services to also offering investment options in gold and other financial instruments.

PhonePe also launched its Switch platform in 2018, which allows users to place orders on over 200 apps including Ola, Myntra, IRCTC, Goibibo, RedBus, and Oyo directly from within the PhonePe mobile app. PhonePe is also accepted at over 11 million merchant outlets across 500 cities nationally, the statement said.

With these five new insurance products and one mutual fund offering, PhonePe hopes to become India’s most comprehensive financial services platform. The company already claims to have already become the “fastest growing insure-tech distributor in India” with mutual fund investments coming in from “over 15,000 pin codes across tier 1, 2 & 3 cities and towns.”

The idea is to give users a simple, frictionless and secure platform to invest in insurance and mutual funds, the company said.