Top 12 Insurance Clerk Skills to Put on Your Resume

In the crowded insurance arena, a sharp resume wins attention. Precision. Speed with care. A knack for systems and people. The right mix shows you can handle the daily hum of policies, claims, and compliance without dropping a bead of data. Below, the core skills to signal you’re ready for the pace and the pitfalls of an insurance clerk role.

Insurance Clerk Skills

1. Data Entry
2. Microsoft Excel
3. Customer Service
4. Claims Processing
5. Salesforce CRM
6. Policy Administration
7. Risk Assessment
8. Underwriting Support
9. Document Management
10. Billing Software
11. Regulatory Compliance
12. SAP FI

1. Data Entry

Data entry for an insurance clerk means capturing policy, claim, and customer information with exactness, keeping records current, and maintaining clean, searchable data across core systems.

Why It's Important

Accurate entry keeps policies correct, claims moving, and audits clean. Fewer errors, faster service, better trust—everything downstream depends on what you type in upstream.

How to Improve Data Entry Skills

Sharper, cleaner, quicker input—aim for all three:

1. Use purpose-built tools: Templates, input masks, and validation rules prevent typos and mismatched formats.
2. Master keyboard shortcuts: Reduce mouse clicks; trim seconds from every action and minutes from every hour.
3. Work with dual monitors: Reference on one screen, entry on the other; less switching, fewer mistakes.
4. Standardize conventions: Clear rules for names, dates, addresses, and document titles keep data uniform.
5. Automate repetition: Forms with prefill, rules-based fields, and import routines cut manual keystrokes.
6. Run quality checks: Spot-audit recent entries; use reports to find anomalies before they spread.

How to Display Data Entry Skills on Your Resume

2. Microsoft Excel

Excel is the workbench for lists, calculations, tracking, and analysis—policy data, premium tables, reconciliations, you name it.

Why It's Important

It turns raw rows into answers. Quick summaries, clean lookups, tidy reports—faster decisions and fewer manual recalcs.

How to Improve Microsoft Excel Skills

1. Lean into formulas: VLOOKUP/XLOOKUP, INDEX/MATCH, SUMIFS, IF/IFS—connect data and control logic.
2. Pivot like a pro: PivotTables and PivotCharts for instant summaries and pattern-spotting.
3. Validate and highlight: Data validation improves input; conditional formatting spotlights risk or exceptions.
4. Automate repetitive steps: Record macros or build simple VBA scripts for routine cleanup and reporting.
5. Know your shortcuts: Selection, navigation, and formatting shortcuts speed everything up.

How to Display Microsoft Excel Skills on Your Resume

3. Customer Service

Customers ask, you answer. Policies, bills, claims, statuses—clear help delivered with patience and speed.

Why It's Important

Service shapes loyalty. Smooth interactions reduce escalations, drive renewals, and protect the brand when the pressure spikes.

How to Improve Customer Service Skills

1. Listen without rushing: Paraphrase, confirm, then act; fewer recontacts, better outcomes.
2. Know the products: Coverage, exclusions, timelines—confidence shortens calls and prevents missteps.
3. Use a CRM well: Log interactions, schedule follow-ups, and personalize based on history.
4. Set expectations: Give clear timelines, next steps, and required documents to prevent dead ends.
5. Close the loop: Follow up after resolution; a quick check-in cements trust.
6. Stay calm under fire: Scripts help, but empathy and tone defuse tension fastest.

How to Display Customer Service Skills on Your Resume

4. Claims Processing

Review, verify, calculate, decide—claims move from intake to settlement through clear rules and clean documentation.

Why It's Important

It’s where promises become payments. Timely, accurate handling preserves trust and reduces leakage, complaints, and rework.

How to Improve Claims Processing Skills

1. Automate the routine: Use workflows for intake, routing, reminders, and document requests.
2. Front-load data quality: Collect complete details at first touch; enforce required fields and formats.
3. Standardize decisions: Checklists and playbooks reduce variance and speed approvals or denials.
4. Keep claimants informed: Status updates and clear next steps lower call volume and anxiety.
5. Watch the metrics: Track aging, cycle times, rework, and denial reasons; fix bottlenecks fast.
6. Flag fraud indicators: Simple rules (inconsistent info, prior losses, unusual timing) prompt deeper review.

How to Display Claims Processing Skills on Your Resume

5. Salesforce CRM

A cloud CRM that centralizes customer data, tasks, and workflows—great for renewals, service requests, and cross-team handoffs.

Why It's Important

One source of truth. Better follow-up, targeted communication, and fewer dropped balls.

How to Improve Salesforce CRM Skills

1. Tune it to insurance: Custom objects, fields, and page layouts that match policy and claim workflows.
2. Automate with Flow: Use Salesforce Flow for renewals, alerts, approvals, and document requests.
3. Integrate key systems: Connect policy admin, billing, and document tools for seamless data flow.
4. Keep learning: Build skills with admin best practices, role-based training, and regular refreshers.

How to Display Salesforce CRM Skills on Your Resume

6. Policy Administration

The life cycle of a policy—issue, endorse, renew, cancel—handled with accuracy and timeliness.

Why It's Important

Mistakes here ripple everywhere. Clean policy data means correct billing, smooth claims, and fewer service headaches.

How to Improve Policy Administration Skills

1. Automate the predictable: Template-driven documents, renewal tasks, and billing schedules reduce manual work.
2. Lock in data integrity: Validation rules, required fields, and reconciliation checks keep records consistent.
3. Stay current: Regulations, forms, and underwriting guidelines change; so should your knowledge and templates.
4. Proactive customer comms: Advance notices for renewals and changes prevent last-minute scrambles.
5. Use feedback loops: Gather input from service, underwriting, and customers to refine workflows.

How to Display Policy Administration Skills on Your Resume

7. Risk Assessment

Evaluate likelihood and impact, then align coverage and price with the risk on the table.

Why It's Important

Good assessment trims losses and prices policies fairly. Bad assessment leaks money or chases customers away.

How to Improve Risk Assessment Skills

1. Use structured data: Standard questionnaires and rating factors keep comparisons fair and consistent.
2. Leverage analytics: Trend reports and segmentation highlight exposures and outliers quickly.
3. Mind the data quality: Incomplete or stale inputs ruin outputs; verify sources and dates.
4. Collaborate widely: Underwriting, claims, and actuarial teams see different angles—combine those views.
5. Track emerging risks: Cyber, climate, supply chain—keep an eye on shifting patterns and adjust criteria.
6. Stay compliant: Align methods with applicable regulations and internal standards to avoid surprises.

How to Display Risk Assessment Skills on Your Resume

8. Underwriting Support

Assist underwriters with data gathering, file preparation, eligibility checks, and documentation that supports clear decisions.

Why It's Important

Solid support cuts turnaround times and helps pricing match risk—key to portfolio health.

How to Improve Underwriting Support Skills

1. Know the guidelines: Appetite, exclusions, authority levels—become fluent to spot issues early.
2. Structure submissions: Standardized file checklists and naming conventions accelerate review.
3. Adopt workflow tools: Automate handoffs, reminders, and approvals to reduce back-and-forth.
4. Boost analysis skills: Basic stats and data checks help you surface the signal from the noise.
5. Communicate crisply: Summaries that are brief, accurate, and timely keep decisions moving.
6. Prioritize ruthlessly: Triage by deadlines and complexity to meet service-level targets.

How to Display Underwriting Support Skills on Your Resume

9. Document Management

Capture, store, index, and secure policy, claim, and customer documents so the right people find the right file fast.

Why It's Important

Good document control reduces rework, strengthens compliance, and speeds audits and service responses.

How to Improve Document Management Skills

1. Digitize everything feasible: Scan, OCR, and index—paper slows you down and goes missing.
2. Adopt a DMS: Versioning, permissions, retention rules, and quick search save hours.
3. Standardize naming: Consistent titles, dates, and tags make retrieval instant.
4. Secure sensitive data: Role-based access, encryption at rest/in transit, and audit trails are nonnegotiable.
5. Back up regularly: Test restores; don’t discover gaps during an incident.
6. Train the team: Short, practical SOPs beat long manuals; reinforce with spot checks.

How to Display Document Management Skills on Your Resume

10. Billing Software

Software that creates invoices, applies payments, and reconciles accounts between carriers, policyholders, and partners.

Why It's Important

Accurate bills, faster cash, fewer disputes. Clean feeds into finance and clear answers for customers.

How to Improve Billing Software Skills

1. Connect core systems: Sync policy admin and CRM to keep charges and adjustments aligned.
2. Build error checks: Validation for rates, dates, and codes prevents costly fixes later.
3. Simplify the interface: Logical flows and clear labels reduce training time and entry errors.
4. Offer flexible reports: Ageing, write-offs, exceptions—custom views for clerks and managers.
5. Harden security: Strong access controls, encryption, and regular audits protect financial data.
6. Stay current: Update for regulatory changes and provide reliable support to users.

How to Display Billing Software Skills on Your Resume

11. Regulatory Compliance

Following the rules that govern insurance: fair practices, privacy, recordkeeping, disclosures, and reporting.

Why It's Important

It protects customers, avoids penalties, and preserves the company’s reputation. Compliance is everyone’s job, every day.

How to Improve Regulatory Compliance Skills

1. Monitor changes: Track updates to applicable laws and internal policies; refresh procedures quickly.
2. Train regularly: Short, role-based training beats once-a-year marathons.
3. Document everything: Keep audit-ready records for transactions, communications, and approvals.
4. Use checklists: Standard steps for disclosures, identity verification, and record retention reduce misses.
5. Audit and remediate: Spot-check work, fix gaps fast, and share lessons learned.
6. Champion data protection: Minimum necessary access, secure storage, and clear incident response.

How to Display Regulatory Compliance Skills on Your Resume

12. SAP FI

SAP Financial Accounting handles postings, reconciliations, and reporting—useful for premium, claims, and general ledger accuracy.

Why It's Important

Fast, accurate financials support clean audits and reliable reporting—vital for premium tracking and claims settlement.

How to Improve SAP FI Skills

1. Ground yourself in fundamentals: Chart of accounts, postings, reconciliations, and period close.
2. Practice in a sandbox: Simulate common tasks—invoice posting, clearing, and reporting—until it’s second nature.
3. Learn core transactions: Focus on day-to-day codes, reports, and common error resolutions.
4. Understand integrations: Know how SAP FI ties to policy systems and subledgers to trace issues end-to-end.
5. Keep up with updates: New features and fixes can simplify workflows—adopt them early.
6. Consider certification: Validates knowledge and signals commitment to accuracy and control.

How to Display SAP FI Skills on Your Resume