Insurance Networking News: Executive Strategies for Technology Management articles from August 2006

Insurance Networking News: Executive Strategies for Technology Management archives from August 2006

Standing Out From The Crowd: Insurance contact centers embrace innovative technology to improve productivity, cut costs and enhance customer relations.(Company overview)
August 1, 2006... Boosting productivity and cutting costs in insurance contact centers is a bit like walking and chewing gum at the same time. It's not so difficult. But boosting productivity, cutting costs and improving customer service is much more...

Help in a Hurricane: Insurers aren't taking the 2006 hurricane season lightly. They've been proactively developing and providing customer service tools and services to fight this year's storms.
August 1, 2006... August - the heart of hurricane season. The hurricanes during August 2005 changed the insurance industry. In fact, with experts predicting a number of storms in 2006, carriers are taking action-developing tools and programs-to help their...

Let There Be Light, Without Wires: Blue Cross of Northeastern Pennsylvania needed a larger network link, but didn't want to lose months of productivity, so it installed a technology called free-space optics to handle the workload in the interim.
August 1, 2006... What could a college campus possibly have in common with a health insurer's operation centers? Very little, but a telecommunication technology common throughout college campuses has improved one health insurer's business. Blue Cross of...

Cell Phones and the Bottom Line.
August 1, 2006... Telecom giant Sprint used National Cell Phone Courtesy Month (July) to re-release its 2004 "Wireless Courtesy Report," which pretty much confirms what we already know: We are annoyed with rude cell phone users, yet we don't think we are among...

News Briefs.(Guardian Life Insurance Company of America)(Lexington Insurance Co.)(CIGNA International Corp.)
August 1, 2006... 24-HOUR ACCESS TO FINANCIAL FITNESS New York-based Guardian Life Insurance Co. of America launched a proprietary Web-based system designed to help financial representatives enable their clients to instantly gauge their financial health and...

Is Your Business Prepared?(Brief article)
August 1, 2006... Customer service during a disaster may be important, but insurers and agencies need to protect and help their own businesses in these times too. The Florida Chamber of Commerce, Tallahassee, Fla., provides free emergency e-mail protection...

Is Congress Prepared?(damages caused by hurricances)(Karen Clark - AIR Worldwide Corp.)(Brief article)
August 1, 2006... Karen Clark, president and CEO of Boston-based AIR Worldwide Corp. told members of Congress and their senior staff in June that a single future hurricane or earthquake has the potential to cause insured losses in excess of $150 billion and...

Solutions.(SETWrite 3.0 - AMS Services Inc.)(Strata Enterprise - CGI Group Inc.)(Agent Portal - Portellus Inc. )
August 1, 2006... REAL-TIME RATING SETWrite 3.0, from AMS Services Inc., Bothell, Wash., enables agents to access rates from, and submit insurance data to, multiple carriers in real-time through single-entry transactions. With more than 30 carriers in...

India Tightens Security: After employees of an Indian outsourcing firm stole from Citibank customers, the Indian outsourcing industry joined forces to implement a number of new security measures.
August 1, 2006... Late spring 2005, the world learned that a crime ring that included call center employees of an Indian outsourcing company stole more than $300,000 from Citibank customers by tricking callers into giving up their PIN numbers. The news sent...

"Homesourcing" A Domestic Alternative.(Willow CSN)(NICE Systems Inc.)
August 1, 2006... There are three main reasons why it's cheaper to outsource work to WillowCSN Inc. than to do it in-house-even though Willow doesn't ship the work off to India, but keeps it in the Unites States. First: Willow's agents work from home as...

News Briefs.
August 1, 2006... SAUERLAND NAMED PROGRESSIVE PRESIDENT The Progressive Corp., Mayfield, Ohio, has appointed John Sauerland as president of the Progressive Direct Group of Insurance Companies. Sauerland, 41, served as Progressive's claims general manager for...

Is Your Call Center A Winner? Take This Test To Find Out.
August 1, 2006... * Are our contact center objectives and measurements aligned with an overall customer-centric business strategy? * Is our contact center able to contribute to stronger long-term customer relationships while maintaining or reducing...

Who's in the Driver's Seat?: Celent research shows a disconnect between what insurance technology buyers value in the sales process and what they're actually getting from their vendors. But insurers are not off the hook for the poor communication that takes place.
August 1, 2006... It's often said that insurers suffer from the "not-invented-here" syndrome, but the fact is: At least in North America, insurers are most likely to look for a vendor solution before embarking on a custom build. In Celent's most recent...

Call Center for the Uninsured Goes National: Phil Lebherz claims 43 million Americans without health insurance could really be closer to 8 million if they knew about programs available to them.(California Uninsured Help Line)(Interview)
August 1, 2006... On the first anniversary of the California Uninsured Help Line in May, Phil Lebherz, founder and initial financier of the free call line looked at national studies and became convinced the uninsured numbers could be cut in half in all states if...

Solutions.(PatchLink.com Corp.)(Good Technology Inc.)(Stampede Technologies Inc.)
August 1, 2006... ENTERPRISE REPORTS FROM CENTRAL WAREHOUSE PatchLink Corp., a Scottsdale, Ariz.-based provider of patch and vulnerability management solutions, introduced Enterprise Reporting Server (ERS) 3.0, which integrates with PatchLink Update to...

VoIP Stepping Up.
August 1, 2006... A free-space optics system is suitable for one of the growing technologies affecting the insurance enterprise: voice over Internet protocol (VoIP) or Internet protocol telephony (IPT). According to a survey from Genesys Telecommunications...

EC: A Key Tool For ERM.(Enterprise Risk Management)
August 1, 2006... Enterprise Risk Management (ERM) continues to gain momentum as an important issue among U.S. life insurance company senior management, and economic capital (EC) software may be the key to successful ERM. In its Life Insurance CFO Survey in...

Simplifying Complexities: Multifaceted. Complex. Archaic. These are terms used by many in the life reinsurance sector to describe the industry's inability to reduce complexity and embrace data quality. Are standards the solution?
August 1, 2006... If the life reinsurance market suffers in its ability to embrace technology, the good news is that it's got a lot to gain by doing so. From a technology perspective, "building the deal," i.e., processing myriad communications between cedants,...

P&C: Some Similar Challenges.(property and casualty insurance industry)
August 1, 2006... The specific problems encountered by P&C reinsurers may differ from the life and annuities sector, largely due to differences in business line complexities. But one thing held in common by both groups-getting up to speed-is an understatement,...

Solutions.
August 1, 2006... WHITEHILL ACQUIRES INSYSTEMS Moncton, New Brunswick-based Whitehill Technologies Inc. purchased InSystems, a wholly owned subsidiary of Standard Register, Dayton, Ohio, Financial terms of the deal were not disclosed. The combined company's...

Ad Index For August 2006.
August 1, 2006... Advertiser Website Address Page # AdminServer www.adminserver.com CV4 EDS SOLCORP www.solcorp.com CV2 Group 1 Software www.g1.com/Ad/RatingTerr/ 19 ...

Is It Possible to Give Consumers What They Want?: Consumers are demanding personalized products and a consistent user experience, regardless of the channel they choose. But fulfilling those expectations isn't easy.
August 1, 2006... Today's consumer is king. With the ability to find an alternative solution for virtually any purchase in a few clicks on the Internet, consumers clearly have the upper hand. They are demanding more personalized products and services that meet...