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| Client : |
| Ecclesiastical |
| Project title : |
| risk surveyor system |
| Brief / Issues addressed : |
Solution Benefits : |
| High cost and high risk of running a business process using paper and the national postal system.
Reduced service levels to the client.
Increased opportunity for failure to deliver and the potential for losing the information.
Cost of storage and cost of production. |
Improved client service levels that are now measurable. Improved, measurable productivity with simplified, traceable workflows. Compliance with industry standards. Reduced cost of ownership. |
| Summary : |
“We like working with Sphere IT; like EIG the company is a niche player and we always have a good feeling working with them; certainly the benefits of working with SphereIT have outweighed any risks one may envisage of working with a small company”.
Ian Wainwright, Ecclesiastical |
| Project description : |
The insurance sector is huge and complicated in the UK. Modern life drives the need to manage and reduce risk in terms of asset values etc. To this end, insurance companies are increasingly differentiating their offerings through the development of niche services and solutions for highly defined categories of needs or types of organisations.
Ecclesiastical Insurance Group is a very successful example of this differentiating process, and today EIG is one of the most respected insurance companies in the UK property market. Amongst its major clients EIG can count the Anglican Church (94% of its properties are covered by EIG) as well as many other denominations. Independent schools care and nursing homes as well as many charities are also significant clients supported by EIG.
The business processes associated with the insuring of property are well defined; they are driven primarily by the need to underwrite the risk and to minimise the exposure of both the insured and the insurer. Traditionally, the ‘Risk Control Survey’ process involves skilled people located across the country (especially where nationwide cover is being offered), with low levels of technical IT know-how and can be time consuming. In addition it has been expensive and reliant on the movement of hardcopy documents through several pairs of hands and often backwards and forwards.
A few years ago EIG embarked on a ‘working smarter not harder’ project: one that would add value to the client, reduce the time and costs for the insurer, and more importantly provide the required information in such a way that it could be distributed, shared, accessed and archived more readily.
Having seen a solution built for a Building Society using IBM Lotus Notes, EIG’s Technical Team decided to build something similar to support and manage the processes and delivery of the Survey and Risk Management Reports (the output from the physical inspection undertaken by EIG) to the underwriter and client. Having encountered initial teething problems with another supplier EIG asked Sphere IT to assist in the implementation of the project and to provide the ongoing management and support of the system.
Sphere IT has developed, with EIG, an industry compliant business process management tool that enables the workflow; including everything from instructing the Risk Control Surveyor right the way through to delivering the report to the Underwriters and the client to be visible, measured, managed and even more importantly stored and retrievable. IBM Lotus with its inherent qualities has formed the platform for the databases and templates that were required and has proved the most stable and reliable technology to base this business service on.
EIG’s clients are now not only protected through their insurance policy but through their Insurer’s investment in technology; thereby providing more timely, cost effective and professional services with the assurance that the information is protected as it is no longer paper and vulnerable to being destroyed or lost.
In addition to storing the reports in a database, EIG also stores hundreds of thousands of photographs. Having armed its team of surveyors with digital cameras, the next move is to look at replacing the traditional clipboard with a handheld device that enables the surveyor to fill in the required details electronically on site and download them to the client managers and underwriters without having to rewrite them.
EIG has seen substantial returns on its investment, not least in terms of productivity; also, the entire process is FSA compliant and has proved to be auditable with great ease. In addition, the company’s service levels are now measurable. |
| Technical Summary : |
| EIG uses a range of technologies from IBM and other vendors. The Risk Control Survey system has been developed using IBM Lotus Notes and runs on an IBM eServer iSeries (AS/400). |
This page last updated 18/05/2005
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