Stephanie Phillips

AIA Australia yesterday announced its partnership with Pain Revolution, a community based educational program aiming to help people who suffer from chronic – or persistent – pain. The initiative is driven by Professor Lorimer Moseley, a pain scientist at the University of South Australia with over 25 years’ experience treating persistent pain.

Each year five million Australians are affected by chronic pain^[1]. For western societies, it costs about as much as diabetes and cancer combined^[2]. Stephanie Phillips, Chief Group Insurance Officer of AIA Australia, said: “Chronic pain is a debilitating condition that reduces quality of life and renders many sufferers incapable of working for long periods of time.”

“At AIA Australia, we want to help our members be well and get well, and to champion Australia and New Zealand to be the healthiest and most protected nations in the world. That’s why we are proud to support Professor Lorimer Moseley and Pain Revolution: we want to help educate, raise awareness and give people the resources to recover from, and also prevent persistent pain.”

he Pain Revolution Ride is an annual regional bike ride. Funds are raised to train local health professionals – or ‘Pain Educators’ – in communities along the Sydney to Albury trail in 2018. This network of trained professionals will then work directly in the community and support other doctors, physiotherapists and health professionals in education and treatment of persistent pain.

Research shows that pain is about protection: The brain ‘creates’ the pain in response to trauma, as a way of alerting the body and protecting it from further injury. However in chronic pain sufferers, the pain continues long after the tissue has healed; the brain has ‘learnt’ the pain and become overly protective.

Phillips added: “A significant number of our customers who lodged a claim with us are suffering from chronic pain. Embedded in our claims philosophy is a focus on ability, rather than disability. Research shows work improves overall wellbeing, we recommend supporting programs that seek to return people to productive work at the time their doctor indicates is appropriate. AIA Australia works with highly skilled allied health professionals who are able to help our customers to support them on their journey back to wellness and work.

“At AIA Australia, we are always looking for how we can more effectively help claimants get back to health and wellness. We see supporting Pain Revolution as a real shared value opportunity – tackling chronic pain and finding a new, effective path to recovery not only has potential benefits for our own claimants, but for society and the millions of Australians suffering this condition.”

The inaugural Pain Revolution ride in 2017 reached over 350 healthcare professionals, 900 patients and 50 community leaders along the regional Melbourne to Adelaide route.

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[1] Pain Australia, Painful Facts, 2017
[2] The American Academy of Pain Medicine, Facts & Figures, 2017

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The launch of AIA Australia’s ‘eClaims’ functionality will provide Sunsuper members with the ability to manage the end-to-end claims process online, tailored to their specific condition, at the touch of a button. As a result, eClaims’ in-built intelligence helps to reduce the amount of paperwork required in claims, enables quicker payments, and helps to identify relevant return to work and rehabilitation services for members.

AIA Australia’s Chief Group Insurance Officer, Stephanie Phillips, said eClaims was part of a broader ‘claims excellence’ initiative for the insurer, with the aim of intervening in claims earlier, streamlining claims processes and moving to an online platform for all of its key partners.

“We are excited about the benefits this will provide to Sunsuper members, their employers and medical practitioners, including improved decision times on claims, and smarter requirements gathering which will cut down processing delays. It goes without saying that claims are made during a difficult time in peoples’ lives so anything we can do to improve the experience for members is going to be welcome”, said Ms Phillips.

Sunsuper’s Manager, Member Benefits Amalie White said the company paid out more than $300 million in insurance claims each year ensuring thousands of Australians were supported when they needed it most, but the insurance claims process could sometimes be onerous.

“We believe AIA Australia’s eClaims function will significantly improve our ability to manage members’ information and enhance the whole claims experience,” she said.

“The aim is to make what can be a hard process easier for our members. “We know that members are more likely to seek help outside of the fund, such as engaging lawyers, when they find the process too complex and overwhelming,” Ms White said.

“The launch of eClaims is a big step toward addressing that complexity. “And this, combined with the fact we manage all our claims in-house with a team from AIA embedded in the business, sets a strong foundation for Sunsuper to set itself apart from others in the industry on claims servicing.”

Members will have the option to upload additional documents online as well as the claim form itself. The system will also include automated reminders to ensure members, doctors and employers submit the required information to streamline the claims process.

Sunsuper currently manages more than $33 billion in assets for Australian employees for around one million members nationwide.

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Ms Phillips, who has been acting in the role since June, has already achieved a number of significant milestones including the development and launch of AIA Australia’s eclaims and rehabilitation programs. Indeed, earlier this year, AIA Australia won Super Review magazine’s ‘Group Insurer of the Year’ award for the second year running.

Stephanie joined AIA Australia in November 2009 and has worked in a number of roles within the Group Insurance division over this period. These included three years in the Corporate Solutions team in Hong Kong in addition to a number of consulting roles in Hong Kong and Australia, before returning to Australia permanently in 2014 as Head of Group Operations and then Head of Group Distribution.

Before joining AIA Australia, Ms Phillips held various roles at HESTA, Superpartners and One Path (formerly ING).

AIA Australia Chief Executive Officer Damien Mu was pleased to announce the promotion in recognition of Ms Phillips’ contribution to the business over the years. “Steph has been an asset to the company and has already achieved some significant milestones in her role as acting Chief Group Insurance Officer.

“Importantly, she provides the team, our clients and our partners with not only the experience required to deliver on the strategic goals of the business, but also good stability and continuity as she has already been acting in the role over the past three months,” he said.

Ms Phillips is also a member of the AIA Australia Executive Committee and will report directly to AIA Australia Chief Executive Officer Damien Mu.

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