Reinsurance is an important part of the insurance industry, so theres no good reason that the process has to be difficult. The reason Manulife Financial was having problems dealing with its reinsurers for large life insurance policies, in what is called a facultative submission, was that so much paperwork had to be exchanged between the two sidesit would take a week or more just to find out if the reinsurer was interested. Multiply that by sixthe typical number of reinsurers Manulife contacts for a particular policyand you have a mountain of paper and a ton of waiting.
For a typical policy, we would have to copy 200 pages of documents six times, said Glenn Beuschel, team leader for Manulifes U.S. reinsurer ceded administration area. It would take several days to a week to get such a fat file delivered by courier to the reinsurers, who would then gauge how much (if any) of the risk it was willing to take on.
Beuschel said the company wanted to use the Internet to send such files electronically, but it felt it needed a secure Web site to protect everyone involved in the transaction. AgoraINS (Insurance Network Solutions) had just such a product and came to Manulife in 1999 to offer a demonstration and ask the Toronto-based life insurer to take part in a pilot of the Web site (www.agorare.com).
Reinsurers were looking for a solution themselves. There were other services out there, but they werent customized to insurance, Beuschel said. This saved us from developing our own solution.
Using the AgoraINS solution, documents are scanned and Manulife batches the files together into a single TIFF file (PDF files are also acceptable for the Web site). The company can then take the policy to agorare.com. Manulife representatives scroll down on the list of reinsurers using the system and pick which ones it wants to send the file to. The reinsurers know only who sent the file and not the names of other companies receiving it.
Instead of taking a week to get the file delivered, it is sent instantly. The site also offers the insurer the ability to track whether the file has been opened. If we see that it has been sitting there for a while unopened (by the reinsurer) we can call them and tell them that a file is there for them, Beuschel said.
AgoraINS takes several security measures, including encryption of the files, and secure passwords and IDs for those opening the file.
Most of the reinsurers that Manulife deals with are already using agorare.com, according to Beuschel. He said the insurer is also encouraging others to become part of the system. We take that into account when we are looking for new reinsurers, he said. Still, not all of its reinsurers are using it and Beuschel said that is the biggest complaint members of his team have. No one likes making a paper copy of the file anymore and then shipping it to a reinsurer. That also causes a problem because of timing, he said. Reinsurers who have seen the file electronically generally have decided what their participation level will be before the paper files have been delivered to other reinsurers.
Other than that, Its working really well, Beuschel said. There have been some growing pains and we would like to see some enhancements for our particular needs, but generally its a complete product.
Some of the savings have been quite noticeable. Our courier costs have been cut substantially, plus the amount of paper we use and the expense of copying, he said.
The combination of saving time and money and being able to securely communicate with your partners is a hard one to pass up. Robert Regis Hyle
The Problem: Find a quicker and less expensive way to get policy information to reinsurers.
The Company: Manulife Financial
Lines: Life, annuities
Funds under management: $142.2 billion
Web site: www.manulife.com
The Software: agorare.com
from AgoraINS
Web site: www.agorains.com
Want to continue reading?
Become a Free PropertyCasualty360 Digital Reader
Your access to unlimited PropertyCasualty360 content isn’t changing.
Once you are an ALM digital member, you’ll receive:
- Breaking insurance news and analysis, on-site and via our newsletters and custom alerts
- Weekly Insurance Speak podcast featuring exclusive interviews with industry leaders
- Educational webcasts, white papers, and ebooks from industry thought leaders
- Critical converage of the employee benefits and financial advisory markets on our other ALM sites, BenefitsPRO and ThinkAdvisor
Already have an account? Sign In Now
© 2024 ALM Global, LLC, All Rights Reserved. Request academic re-use from www.copyright.com. All other uses, submit a request to [email protected]. For more information visit Asset & Logo Licensing.
