Getting their feet webbed: for the past 18 months, Lexington has been automating policy administration in the underwriting process, and as many as nine products are distributed over the Web. The most complex transactions, however, are still paper-based

Risk & Insurance, Jan, 2005 by Tom Starner

First of all, agents and underwriters should be able to access the system whenever they want, wherever they are. An Internet-enabled system will allow agents to log in and quote business from home or via a wireless connection, and lets experienced underwriters evaluate risks from an Internet care or even by using a PDA while sitting in traffic. Also, to avoid the costs of extensive training of new agents, a system should be easy to learn and to use.

The system should be able to grow with the company, or it will disrupt business. The same can be said for a system that is not fault-tolerant. The system should also handle your workflows your way and change with the way you work over time. A policy administration system that doesn't provide detailed and complete records of all changes to policies is broken.

If you're still scouring file rooms for misplaced documents, your system is broken. Every document within any file should forever be "a click away." A policy administration system should also ensure that legal documents are never changed.

Rating an insurance policy is seldom simple, so the policy administration system must be flexible. It should allow variations by company, by state and by date. Systems that cannot handle the complex and dynamic realities of rating are broken.

In addition, there are some "power features" that should be considered. Those include a policy timeline graphical display that indicates each date a policy is changed; a policy history that summarizes all activity on the policy; and a "what-if" capability to show how changes to limits, deductibles and exposures would impact premiums.

--Bradley S. Fordham. Fordham is chief technology officer of Ravello Solutions. He can be reached at bsf@ravellosolutions.com. Ravello Solution's CEO, Tom Rosencrants, was a keynote speaker at the 13th Annual National Workers" Compensation and Disability Conference in Chicago in November