Delivering on the promise: How corporate culture influences customer benefits in insurance claim handling

Corporate culture is viewed as an important organizational capability, yet its effects on customer outcomes, particularly under conditions of stress, remain unclear. To address this gap, this study examines claim settlement in the U.S. property–liability insurance industry using insurer-level data and a difference-in-differences design based on disaster exposure. We analyze claim duration, payment likelihood, and inverse loss ratio. The results reveal a striking asymmetry across market segments. Following disaster shocks, insurers exhibiting higher scores in corporate culture resolve claims faster and are more likely to pay in commercial lines, while effects are largely absent in personal lines. This heterogeneity is consistent with institutional differences across commercial and personal insurance that may shape managerial discretion and coordination, although our empirical design does not distinguish this mechanism from other potential explanations. These results show that corporate culture may function as an operational capability whose influence on claim-settlement outcome varies systematically across insurance lines.