CLASSIFYING RATE FACTORS IN CONSUMER PROFILES BASED ON EFFECTS OF THE FACTORS IN HIGH-DIMENSIONAL MODELS

1 . A tangible, non-transitory, machine readable medium storing instructions that when executed by one or more processors effectuate operations comprising:

receiving, with one or more servers of an insurance comparison application, from a user computing device, a request to access the insurance comparison application;

sending, with one or more servers of the insurance comparison application, to the user computing device, via a network, one or more user interfaces having a plurality of user inputs configured to receive user-entered attributes and return the user-entered attributes to the insurance comparison application;

receiving, with one or more servers of the insurance comparison application, from the user computing device, via the network, four or more attributes of a user, the attributes being entered into the user inputs of the one or more user interfaces sent by the insurance comparison application;

determining, with one or more processors, respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user; and

sending, with one or more servers of the insurance comparison application, to the user computing device, via the network, instructions to present a subsequent user interface with visual elements indicating the respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user, wherein three or more of the visual elements indicate three or more respective amounts of effects of three or more attributes of the user on price of insurance for the user.

2 . The method of claim 1 , comprising:

for each of at least three of the respective amounts, classifying the corresponding attribute based on the respective amount of effect of the respective attribute on price of insurance for the user; and

determining the visual elements for each corresponding attribute based on a respective result of a respective classification.

3 . The method of claim 2 , wherein:

classifying comprises assigning an ordinal classification to the respective attributes.

4 . The method of claim 3 , wherein:

assigning ordinal classifications comprises assigning different ordinal classifications to at least some attributes and assigning the same ordinal classification to at least some attributes.

5 . The method of claim 3 , wherein:

at least some ordinal classifications scale linearly in stepwise fashion with at least some attribute values.

6 . The method of claim 2 , wherein:

classifying comprises assigning a respective letter grade to each of the at least three attributes; and

determining visual elements comprises instructing the user computing device to display assigned letter grades in association with labels identifying graded attributes.

7 . The method of claim 1 , comprising:

ranking the attributes based on the respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user; and

selecting attributes above a threshold rank for inclusion in the subsequent user interface with the visual elements indicating the respective amounts, wherein attributes below the threshold ranking are not displayed in the subsequent user interface with the visual elements indicating the respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user.

8 . The method of claim 1 , comprising:

ranking the attributes based on the respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user, wherein the instructions to present the subsequent user interface with visual elements indicating the respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user comprises:

instructing the user computing device to display identifiers of at least some of the attributes in ranked order.

9 . The method of claim 1 , wherein:

determining respective amounts of effects comprises, for a given attribute, estimating a contribution of the given attribute toward price of insurance for the user and comparing the estimated contribution to a distribution of contributions of the given attribute to prices of insurance for a group of users.

10 . The method of claim 1 , wherein:

determining respective amounts of effects comprises, for a given attribute, determining a partial derivative of price of insurance for the user with respect to the given attribute.

11 . The method of claim 1 , wherein determining respective amounts of effects comprises:

accessing a model that estimates price based on a weighted sum of the attributes;

calculating a plurality of products of respective attributes and respective weights of the model corresponding to the respective attributes; and

determining the respective amounts based on calculated respective products corresponding to the respective attributes.

12 . The method of claim 1 , wherein determining respective amounts of effects comprises, for a given attribute:

accessing a pricing weight applied to the given attribute in an insurance price estimation model;

comparing the given attribute to a distribution of the given attribute in a population to determine a value indicative of percentage of the population that has an instance of the given attribute is larger than the given attribute of the user; and

determining a respective amount of effect of the given attribute on the price of insurance for the user based on both the pricing weight and the value indicative of percentage of the population that has an instance of the given attribute is larger than the given attribute of the user.

13 . The method of claim 1 , comprising selecting and grading a subset of the attributes that have a larger effect on price of insurance for the user than unselected attributes among the four or more attributes.

14 . The method of claim 1 , wherein:

the one or more user interfaces and the subsequent user interface are webpages;

the subsequent user interface presents four or more of the attributes as rate factors presented adjacent an insurability score, each rate factor being visually associated with an identifier of an ordinal classification indicating whether the respective rate factor raises or lowers the price of insurance for the user; and

the ordinal classifications are determined based on a rate factor model that is calibrated based on a plurality of calibration records obtained by querying an insurance pricing analytics application before receiving the request to access the insurance comparison application.

15 . The method of claim 1 , wherein:

the three or more attributes are classified into ordinal categories according to three or more different scales by which values are binned;

the price of insurance is a price of automotive insurance; and

the received attributes comprise at least seven of the following:

gender,

marital status,

age,

driving history,

credit rating,

current insurance status,

home ownership status,

annual miles driven,

geolocation,

make of vehicle to be insured,

model of vehicle to be insured, or

year of vehicle to be insured.

16 . The method of claim 1 , wherein:

determining respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user comprises steps for determining respective amounts of effects of respective attributes on price of insurance.

17 . The method of claim 1 , comprising:

steps for classifying respective amounts of effects of respective attributes on price of insurance; and

steps for determining which attributes to present to the user in a report indicative of which attributes have larger effects on the price of insurance than other attributes.

18 . The medium of claim 1 , the operations comprising:

sending a plurality of insurance options to the user computing device for presentation to the user.

19 . The medium of claim 18 , wherein:

each of the insurance options is associated with an address of a server of a respective insurance provider of the respective insurance option.

20 . A method, comprising:

receiving, with one or more servers of an insurance comparison application, from a user computing device, a request to access the insurance comparison application; sending, with one or more servers of the insurance comparison application, to the user computing device, via a network, one or more user interfaces having a plurality of user inputs configured to receive user-entered attributes and return the user-entered attributes to the insurance comparison application;

receiving, with one or more servers of the insurance comparison application, from the user computing device, via the network, four or more attributes of a user, the attributes being entered into the user inputs of the one or more user interfaces sent by the insurance comparison application;

determining, with one or more processors, respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user; and

sending, with one or more servers of the insurance comparison application, to the user computing device, via the network, instructions to present a subsequent user interface with visual elements indicating the respective amounts of effects of the respective attributes on price of insurance for the user, wherein three or more of the visual elements indicate three or more respective amounts of effects of three or more attributes of the user on price of insurance for the user.