Senators Ask Home and Auto Insurers to Describe Their Use of AI in Claims

Senators Elizabeth Warren and Josh Hawley have asked the chief executives of home and auto insurers to put in writing how their companies use artificial intelligence on claims. The request is the sixth of seven questions in letters dated October 2, 2026. It reads in full: “Describe your company’s use of artificial intelligence, predictive analytics, or other automated tools in the homeowners and personal auto claims process, including the safeguards in place to ensure fair and accurate claims determinations.” The senators asked for responses “no later than October 16, 2026.”

Warren signs as Ranking Member of the Committee on Banking, Housing, and Urban Affairs. Hawley signs as United States Senator. He has signed this kind of letter before: in July he and Senator Richard Blumenthal wrote to three Medicare Advantage insurers asking how they make post-acute care coverage decisions and what part algorithms or software play in them. A news release from the Senate Banking Committee’s minority, dated October 5, says the letters went to six insurers: State Farm, Allstate, USAA, Farmers, Liberty Mutual, and American Family. The release links to each letter on the committee’s website. InsureAI Wire read all six, and they carry the same seven questions and the same deadline.

Question 6 is the only place in the letters where artificial intelligence, predictive analytics, or automated tools appear. The questions around it are mostly about outcomes and data. Question 1 asks for ten years of yearly figures on claim fulfillments and claims closed without payment in homeowners and personal auto. The figures are to be broken out by peril and by the reason no payment was made, such as a deductible, a policy exclusion, a formal denial, or a withdrawal by the policyholder. Question 2 asks how many denied or unpaid claims policyholders appealed or disputed, and how often the company later paid or reversed itself. Question 3 asks the company to explain and quantify what drove the increase in unpaid claims over the decade.

Two questions sit closer to the AI request because they ask how claims are handled rather than how they turned out. Question 4 asks whether the company has made “any material changes” to its homeowners or personal auto claims-handling policies, procedures, or guidelines since 2015, and why. Question 5 asks about compensation, bonus, and evaluation programs for employees, contractors, adjusters, or managers involved in claims that use metrics such as claim payments, settlement amounts, claims closed without payment, or denial rates. Question 6 asks for a description of the company’s use of AI, predictive analytics, or other automated tools in the homeowners and personal auto claims process and of the safeguards behind it. It does not ask for numbers, name a tool, or say what the senators would count as a fair and accurate determination.

The letters’ stated concern is the share of claims closed with no payment. Citing The Wall Street Journal, they say the recipient is among several companies that together did not pay 44 percent of home insurance policyholders’ claims resolved last year, up from 36 percent ten years ago. They also quote later Journal reporting that “auto insurers didn’t pay out on 45% of auto liability and medical claims they resolved last year,” up from about 35 percent in 2016. The letters acknowledge that “claims may be closed without payment for a variety of reasons.” They do not attribute the rise in unpaid claims to artificial intelligence or automated tools. In industry reaction collected by Insurance Journal, NAMIC said “a closed claim is not the same as a denied claim.”

The letters carry no subpoena, and they describe no consequence for a company that misses October 16. Question 7 asks each company to commit to providing the Committee and the public with its annual claims data, “just like mortgage lenders report their loan data to the public.” No similar commitment is requested for the description of AI tools and safeguards, and the letters leave open whether any answer to Question 6 will be made public.