Pennsylvaniastill hold their own, mostly as mutual insurance companies owned by their policyholders. They tend to prosper by a thorough understanding of their specific marketplaces and giving excellent service to their agents (and, through them, to their policyholders).

That level of service doesnt come easy, though, particularly since running the IT shop of a smaller carrier poses a bigger challengestaff, or the lack thereof, to handle the same kinds of policy processing, imaging, general ledger, claims, and other systems at work at larger organizations.

We actually doubled our IT staff in 2004, says Albert Creveling, head of technology at Millville Mutual. I hired an assistant. Until his assistant came on board to do RPG programming and miscellaneous PC support, Creveling had been doing it all himself, and Millville uses almost all internally written and supported systems with one exceptionits ImageRight system.

Our primary policy processing system was started on an IBM System34 and finished on a System36, although today we run it on an AS400, he explains. Much of it has been rewritten, but parts continue to run in System36 emulation mode. Creveling filled 12 years ago the position then held by Millvilles current treasurer, John Kitchenthe author of the original system. It was nice to be able to go up to the guy who wrote the original system, if I had questions, when I didnt know the system as well as I do now.

Creveling graduated from Bloomsburg University in Pennsylvania with a degree in business administration. His career began as a computer operator for a local bank, and then he moved over to Bechtel, a large international construction firm, for six years, where he was transferred to different locations in various states before returning to take a position with a resort in the Poconos. The next stop was Millville.

The insurer writes mostly personal lines, staying away from auto, and is growing steadily in small commercial. Its customer base now is up to almost 60,000 policyholders, yet it operates with only 24 employees, including claims adjusters (two of whom are remote).

Not all of Millvilles systems are internally written, however. Our president, Paige Raski, came across some financial calculators on the Web and figured if a company could write something that complex, it certainly could handle our rating disks, Creveling says. The company, Pine Grove Software, wrote the software Millvilles agents use to rate and order homeowners, mobile homeowners, and dwelling fire policies. After the policies are rated in the agents office, the information is transferred to Millville electronically. The application and images, such as photos of the property, go directly into the ImageRight system, and the data goes into our policy processing system. If the underwriter approves the application, it is simply a keystroke to issue the policy, he adds.

Millville outsourced its BOP rating software to EZ-Rater, which has worked very well, Creveling says, and now is taking delivery of a new system for farm- owners rating, also from EZ-Rater.

Since Millville Mutual writes a lot of property insurance, it has contracted with a Dallas firm, InsVista, to send out its lienholder notices. InsVista consolidates these notices for various carriers and sends out some electronically and others by mail. The firm provides the service for less than Millville would pay for postage alone, according to Creveling. InsVista makes money, and we save money, he affirms.

For Creveling, delegating may not be a big option, but he makes the most of what hes got.