Docuplus

AXA Insurance

AXA Insurance is one of the largest insurance companies in the UK. With the help of specialist Docuplus Limited, it has recently implemented a new document production system for customer and agent communications.

Overcoming internal skill shortages, the work has given AXA Insurance valuable experience in new technologies. By using outside expertise, the project was also completed on time.

Part of the global AXA Group, AXA Insurance handles non-life insurance including household, motor, commercial and employers’liability. Incorporating Provincial Insurance and the non-life business of Guardian Royal Exchange, AXA Insurance is the UK’s third largest general insurance company. The life assurance business is handled by sister company AXA Sun Life, helping to produce worldwide revenues of £38 billion.

According to Service Delivery Manager Bryan Hardaker, the fast-growing AXA Group runs many disparate systems on different hardware platforms including ICL and IBM.Most of the applications were written in-house, reflecting the specialist nature of the insurance business. Seeking an up-to- date system, AXA Insurance decided to deploy a package from insurance software company Huon Solutions. Designed to improve customer service, the decision also created a fresh challenge. Like other modern packages, the IBM mainframe-based solution outputs a data stream rather than pre-formatted reports. The stream is intercepted, formatted and output to laser printers. By avoiding application driven reporting, it's easy to create and maintain high quality documents to your own design.

“We needed a good way of managing this unformatted data. We wanted a flexible print solution with the intention of minimizing future change at program level, ”said Hardaker.

Several other AXA companies had already found the answers in M&I Data Services (now Metavante) Custom Statement Formatter, distributed in Europe by LASERCOM (now by Docuplus). As a strategic tool for creating business documents, it was used by AXA Sun Life and other AXA European companies. CSF was considered a valuable resource in a corporate mission to create superior customer service. The only problem was the lack of knowledge.

”We needed skills in a very specialised product. Deadlines were extremely tight and our small print team of two had no CSF experience. We had just 12 weeks for the project, ” Hardaker explains.

Following an initial high-level project analysis and scopeing of requirements, LaserCom immediately recommended the services of Docuplus for the project. The company specialises in the document composition and production marketplace, providing a high quality range of dedicated professional services. Its expertise covered all the leading systems including CSF.

“Docuplus explained what skills they had and what I needed for CSF. I was very impressed with their attitude which gave me confidence that the project would be completed on time.”

The work started in the closing weeks of 1998. CSF Workshop and CSF MVS were installed with on- site training for AXA Insurance. Two CSF-experienced people from Docuplus took on tasks that included document redesign to new corporate standards. They worked alongside AXA personnel, alternating between offices in Kendal and Cardiff. Hardaker says the company proved ‘extremely flexible’to the working arrangements.

In CSF terms, the project to implement a new household insurance application was fairly straightforward. The challenge came from the relatively short time available before the first phase of Huon Solutions went live. Over 30 interrelated documents were required, ranging from acknowledgement letters to insurance certificates. Using AXA headed or continuation paper, output is to small office printers or high-volume laser printers for bulk mailings.

Despite the intense time pressures on everyone involved, explains Hardaker, the project went very well. Docuplus took all the practical responsibility for combining multi-location working with off-site development. They also built up an effective relationship with the AXA team implementing the Huon Solutions package.Furthermore, they proved good in a crisis when Hardaker spent time on another project. It proved a valuable bonus during a period of important corporate change.

“To help me out, Docuplus took on the project management of the whole print project. It’s another good example of their flexibility.”

There are further instances of a willingness to help out. For example,the company assisted with some tricky font and printer problems, coached AXA staff in practical CSF skills and drew up new document standards.Backed by a confident approach to project management, easy resource availability and ‘unobtrusive’account management, the project was fully completed on time.

The use of CSF technology continues to grow as AXA Insurance switches more of its legacy applications to Huon Solutions. In the months after the first project, more laser-printed documents were added, which doubled the original total. Continuing to work with Docuplus for CSF skills, says Hardaker, has been a refreshing change for a manager experienced in dealing with numerous suppliers. Not all are as conscientious and professional in their approach to IT projects.

“Docuplus are extremely flexible and helpful with an excellent set of CSF skills. They helped me deliver my project successfully against very tight deadlines, ”concludes Hardaker.