News

7-Eleven hopes auto insurance will help drive Vcom revenue

November 19, 2002

DALLAS -- 7-Eleven, Inc. (NYSE: SE) has formed a five-year strategic alliance with Public Access Insurance, a company that promotes and sells automobile related products and insurance services through alternative distribution channels, for Public Access to offer automobile-related insurance services via 7-Eleven stores' Vcom kiosks.

Under the agreement, Public Access will be the exclusive retailer of Instant Auto Agency automobile insurance-related products and services to be offered through Vcom. Instant Auto Agency and Public Access are subsidiaries of Instant Insurance Holdings, Inc., a vertically integrated group of companies specializing in the underwriting, marketing and claim processing of non-standard automobile insurance. According to a news release, Instant Insurance Holdings will process in excess of $300 million of automobile insurance premiums in 2002.

At the kiosks, 7-Eleven customers will have direct access to Public's centralized service center, where they can obtain automobile quotes, purchase their policy, pay their monthly bill and talk to a customer service representative. The auto insurance service is expected to be available on 7-Eleven's Vcom machines in the second quarter of 2003.

"Leveraging the Vcom technology and 7-Eleven's convenient locations provides our customer an ease of doing business not found in the automobile insurance market today," said Les Schlesinger, president of Public Access, in the release. "Serving our customer, where and when they want to shop will differentiate us from the traditional brick-and-mortar insurance retail agency without sacrificing customer service."

Schlesinger said that 50 percent of his company's monthly clientele pay their auto insurance bills by cash or money order, making Vcom a convenient conduit for their payments because the kiosk accepts cash -- up to 30 bills of different denominations at one time -- through the machine's bunch-note acceptor. Customers can also purchase money orders at the kiosk.

Public Access also offers its products through 35 ZapLink kiosks at Circle K stores in the Phoenix area. The kiosks feature Internet and e-mail access along with a variety of services and retail applications, including bill payment and Internet payphone capabilities.

Info Touch Technologies, provider of the ZapLink kiosks, announced in September that it plans to deploy up to 500 more of the kiosks, including 100 in the first half of 2003.

Currently, 7-Eleven customers can use the Vcom kiosks to conduct American Express ATM transactions, purchase Western Unionmoney orders and money transfers, pay bills through Western Union's Quick Collect payment service and cash checks through Certegy Check Services, a division of Certegy, Inc.

(See related story 7-Eleven's Vcom wins raves at RD)

7-Eleven plans to offer online shopping where customers will be able to order products and pay for them at the kiosk with cash through Cyphermint, Inc. starting in 2003. Also next year, Vcom will give customers access to Verizon Communications Inc.'s e-commerce platform where they can order Verizon Long Distance, add a phone line, request repair or services like Caller ID, view or pay their bills.

According to the release, future Vcom services could include walk-in bill payment, online banking, pre-approved lines of credit, event ticketing, travel directions and road maps.  

Currently, Vcom is operating in approximately 185 7-Eleven stores in Texas, Florida, Colorado and Virginia. 7-Eleven plans to have Vcom kiosks in 1,000 of its stores around the country in the second quarter of 2003. If those kiosks meet expectations, the company will  install an additional 2,500 starting late next year.

[Editor's note: Info Touch Technologies became Tio Networks in April 2006.]