Hybrid interface

Rough Notes, Jul 2002 by Ashenhurst, John

A proposal for agents, carriers, vendors, and customers

Recently I had occasion to take a hard look at the interface picture. I wanted to understand what was really happening with upload, download, real-time quoting, carrier Web sites, SEMCI, and other interface arcana. Over the past year I'd talked with a number of agents, vendors and carriers and what emerged was more fog than clarity.

In May I decided I really needed to do some homework, then write up an overview of the interface landscape. The resulting paper, "The Truth about Interface: What It Means and What to Do about It." is available gratis for download from my Web site, www.soundingline.com. If you want grounding in the history of interface, ACORD, IVANS, and SEMCI and why the old vision is no longer relevant, this 10-page white paper is worth a read.

The following discussion is a specific proposal to the industry that follows from the findings of the white paper and may be a bit easier to understand with that paper as background. Overall. I'm convinced that the industry is operating with a vision that was appropriate 10 years ago but which no longer fits the facts, problems, and opportunities of the present. Rather than beating what is clearly a dead horse, I think it's time to create a new, shared vision, do a little work, then harvest some real, practical industry interface benefits.

As I asked questions, listened, and thought about what I'd heard while researching the white paper, a picture emerged of what interface could become-rather quickly-- that could actually serve the interests of agents, carriers, vendors, and the forgotten party at the table-customers. The short way to describe this view is to call it Hybrid Interface, a process combining agency software (management systems, comparative rating, etc.), carrier Web sites, bridging (with security) and download (immediate, perhaps, and batch).

Overall, the idea is that agents would be able to move reasonably effortlessly between their management systems (also rating) and relevant carrier sites-with the management system providing information to the Web site so that it could "pre-navigate" the agency user to the right page in the carrier Web site-with the data from the agency system pre-filling (when relevant) the form on the carrier site.

So, for instance, an agent could comparatively quote a new piece of business, choose where to place it, and then be taken transparently to the right page on the right carrier's Web site-with the quoting information automatically filled into the carrier form(s). Or a CSR who needed to change a policy could call it up on the agency management system, key in the changes, then click a link that would go to the carrier's (appropriate) policy change area-pre-filling and reconciling changes with current information. (In both cases, the changes to the carrier system would be synchronized with the management system via overnight download.) Or, again, a CSR who wanted to know the direct bill balance for a policy would go to the management system area for account balances, click a link, and then be taken to the right area of the carrier site-with the balance for the policy displayed immediately.

The exact details of how this hybrid environment would work aren't as important as its purpose-namely:

* To allow carriers to provide rich, deep services to their agencies through a channel they can control (their agency portals) that also allows them to reduce internal processing and costs.

* To allow agents to continue to use the technology they prefer to orchestrate workflow while completing insurance transactions right now, enjoying single entry (in a multi-carrier environment)--and also extending some of this point-of-sale/point-of-service functionality and data out through the agency Web sites to their customers (outfacing services).

* To allow vendors to continue to improve their systems to more fully satisfy their agency constituency-- while at the same time taking advantage of the good work carriers are doing-and without having to spend excessive time and money pursuing a plethora of alternative interface approaches.

* All-in-all, the hybrid environment would support competition (carrier to carrier and vendor to vendor) and at the same time would be to the advantage of agent and customer.

What about upload? It made sense 10 years ago, perhaps, but it doesn't provide enough benefit to either agents or carriers, and it's not easy to do. Upload doesn't cover policy changes-what agents do more frequently than new business or maybe even quotes. The upload model is one of transferring edited and complete forms to the carrier for processing-and thus is a perpetuation of the old division of labor between agents and carriers and not something that reforms the distribution process the way once and done can. Wouldn't it be better to really reform the insurance process and just take the agent to the carrier functionality rather than try to imbed the carrier process into the agency system (environment)?