| TECHNOLOGY & YOUR AGENCY |
No more paper policies
By Mele Fuller, AAI, AIM, ACE, AIS, AIT, ARA, ARM, FIDM, FLMI
here’s been movement to
eliminate the agent copy
of personal lines policies.
Most agencies do not
receive a physical “agent’s” copy
of a policy anymore. They receive
ACORD standard policy download
to maintain current personal lines
data in their management systems
(although many carriers provide
access to the full policy on their
agency portals). With personal lines
being almost exclusively direct bill,
the carrier sends a printed copy of
the policy to the policyholder.
T
commercial lines
still behind
But commercial lines is still working
to catch up. Carriers still print,
collate, and mail paper policies to
the agency – both the agent’s and
the insured’s copies. The upshot is
the agency then mails the insured’s
copy to them. Agencies on the whole
want to eliminate their dependency
on paper copies of policies, but they
may feel a need for a copy in order
to service their customers. At the
same time, many of their customers
are interested in receiving electronic
copies rather than paper.
activity notification
offers pdf of policies
A carrier can use ACORD XML
standard ‘Activity Notification’
messages to electronically send a
full copy of a policy to an agency.
These notification messages are very
simple in format, and can include a
PDF attachment of the policy when
4
needed – which the agency can then
store in their agency management
system. For the carrier, this eliminates
the cost of the printing infrastructure
and postage - which can be very high
on commercial policies. As an added
benefit, the Activity Notification
process works to eliminate paper
storage in the agency.
ACORD notification messages are
used today by a number of companies
to send copies of policies to their
agents. The messages are currently
sent via the IVANS network, just as
policy download is sent. The policies
are sent separately and do not replace
the policy download.
Susan LaBarre,
Liberty Mutual:
“More and more of our agents
are receiving their policy copies
(agent, insured, or both copies)
through daily ACORD Activity
Notifications. They love the fact
that they no longer have to scan,
index, and shred paper copies in
their offices. The documents are
automatically delivered to their
agency management system daily.
Even those agencies not receiving
commercial lines download are
excited about Activity Notifications
because there is no chance of the
transaction overwriting any data in
their system, and they receive much
faster than through USPS.”
These Activity Notification messages
are an ACORD XML standard
KANSAS INSURANCE AGENT & BROKER |January-February 2015|
developed to provide secure
communications between carrier and
agency. While historically carriers
and agents have shared documents
via email attachments, email is not
as secure as the use of ACORD
notification messages. It is becoming
increasingly obvious that focus must
be put on securing data as it travels
over the Internet.
more than just
policy attachments
Activity Notifications can also be used
for more than policy attachments.
Typically today, carriers send pending
cancellation notices (e.g., late
payment notices), ren