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CLIEDIS News
CLIEDIS Hosts Successful Summit
Jan 27 2010 “It’s about TIME!” says the Canadian Life Insurance industry. CLIEDIS hosted a full day summit meeting attended by 130 industry delegates from all corners of the industry. Attending were 33 executives from insurance companies, 53 distributors and 44 industry suppliers. Attendees discussed the benefits of finally getting rid of paper and moving towards comprehensive electronic processes. The key is “straight through processing”. Today most information on the paper application is manually entered into many different computer systems. With straight through processing, when the advisor completes the application with the client electronically, the answers are checked and clarified. The data on the application is then shared securely and immediately with those that are a necessary part of the process which includes the advisor, the advisor’s distribution company, the insurance company, as well as to any of the industry suppliers that arrange medical tests with the client. Byren Innes, Senior Vice President & Director with NewLink Group Inc. a consultancy firm to the life insurance industry gave the results of a survey of insurance advisors . “Advisors see this change as resulting in a more satisfied customer. For the advisor, they see a significant decrease in administrative workload resulting in increased resources available for client communication, and servicing as well as greater professionalism." Scott Sinclair, Chief Operating Officer of Transamerica Life explained how it translates to greater professionalism. "All this paper forms part of the legal agreement of an insurance policy. With long forms it is easy to miss a checkbox or not provide enough of an explanation about a visit to a doctor. The advisor then needs to go back to the client for updates to the information and can feel awfully foolish for what seems in the client eyes as something trivial. Not to mention, all that paper, and the courier and transportation involved, do not create a very green solution." The Canadian insurance industry is admittedly late for this type of technology. There is now a consensus that the life insurance industry can do something similar to what the Canadian investment fund industry did. Consider this, says Tim Fitzpatrick, President, Virtgroup, “All this paper has to be sent by mail and courier and shuffled on employee desks. In the late 1980s it took 28 days for a customer to open a new mutual fund account as it was all then driven by paper Today it takes at most 3 business days to settle as the purchase is recorded and checked electronically by all parties using standards and a shared network. It is 2010 and yet on average it takes 36 days to process and issue an average insurance policy. Aside from the time required for medical testing, for some insurance applications, this timeline could be cut to as little as 24 hours.” Byren Innes concluded “Advisors are uniform in saying that this is the single most-important change that can happen and should have been implemented years ago!” For more information on the summit, including the results of the Advisor survey, meeting notes and the Bridge Group mandate, click on "The Executive Summit is a Success" at the top of this webpage
Advisors Asked to Provide Input for Summit
Dec 22 2009 CLIEDIS asked advisors to complete a short survey to provide input for the Executive Summit: Building the Faster Future ... Drop Costs, Drive Sales. The survey asked about potential benefits to advisors and their clients on processing insurance application on a fully electronic basis. The results of the survey will be available on January 28, 2010.
CLIEDIS Moves to Address Electronic Data Feed Quality Assurance Issues
Nov 24 2009 As we move to an industry based on standardized electronic data feeds, we are now seeing and hearing about data quality and processing issues. We now have actual feeds being used in the real world based on guidelines agreed to by distributors, carriers and vendors (aka CITS). The fact that we now these much anticipated feeds is leading to fresh challenges. Most notably, the challenges that different vendors are having trying to process the feeds into distributors systems and the problems that are faced when the feeds contain unexpected data scenarios. CLIEDIS is moving to address these data quality and processing issues. We are establishing a process for communicating data quality issues and a forum for CLIEDIS member carriers, vendors and distributors to voice their concerns. By providing such a forum, we will endeavour to resolve the issues and, as a result, increase satisfaction for all stakeholders in this new electronic environment. The CLIEDIS website has been updated to allow you to submit your issues. Issues will be communicated via the website once an initial investigation has been done. We are hoping that as issues are addressed and publicized, you will know whether a problem you are having has already been addressed and how it was resolved. The process will evolve as we learn the most appropriate was to address issues.
CLIEDIS Resumes CITS Agent Contracting Data Feed Initiative
Oct 07 2009 After a break to work on higher priority CITS (Canadian Insurance Transaction Standardization) initiatives, CLIEDIS is resuming work on the CITS Agent Contracting data feed. This initiative will develop implementation guidelines for transmitting the information from the CLHIA G8 (Screening Agents for Suitability: Standard Form for Contract or Sponsorship) in a standardized electronic format. A meeting is being held at the end of October to review the draft Implementation Guide and review the non-standard questions that carriers ask to ensure that information can also be transmitted using the ACORD XML for Life data standard. CLIEDIS members are invited to attend this meeting. Details of the meeting are available on the CLIEDIS website, just sign in and go to CITS Working Groups.
CITS Electronic Document Transfer Initiative
Oct 07 2009 CLIEDIS members worked during the summer to develop guidelines for transmitting documents electronically. Draft implementation guidelines are now available to CLIEDIS members. CLIEDIS has requested changed to the ACORD data standard for this initiative and these changes will be voted on in November 2009. When these changes are approved, CLIEDIS members will be able to use the implementation guidelines to generate standardized electronic document data feeds.
CLIEDIS Attracts Attention from the Press
May 12 2009 A number of news articles were written from the media who attended CLIEDIS' Annual seminar. With record attendance and a lively audience engaged in the messages being presented, the media took notice.Philip Porado from Advisor.ca wrote about the message that distributors were sending to carriers about the need for more electronic data feeds: Insurance Distributors Push for Electronic Data Feeds Gavin Adamson from Investment Executive focused his article about the annual seminar on the frustrations experienced by disitributors with carriers for their slow implementation of standardized electronic data feeds. Slow Adoption of Electronic Data Transfer leaves Insurance Distributors Frustrated Insurance.Canada provided their perspective on the message at the annual seminar with the focus on moving forward. CLIEDIS AGM and Seminar Focuses on Moving Ahead
CLIEDIS Annual Seminar is a Success
May 06 2009 CLIEDIS' annual seminar, held on April 30 and May 1, 2009 was a great success. With many of the top distributors in attendance, their message that they are more than ready to accept electronic data feeds from carriers was heard loud and clear. John Hamilton, President, Financial Horizons Group, spoke of the frustrations that distributors experience in a non-data feed world and required carriers in attendance to commit to going back to their organizations to spread the message about carriers' readiness to accept standardized electronic data feeds. Byren Innes presented the results of CLIEDIS' latest survey. The results were generally positive, with standardized data feeds becoming more accepted as a means of transmitting informaiton. Copies of both John Hamilton's and Byren Innes' presentations are available on the CLIEDIS website. CLick on "About CLIEDIS" and go to Seminar. For CLIEDIS members, details of the survey results and attendee lists are available by signing in and clicking on Past Seminars.
CITS Broker Update Initiative
Mar 04 2009 CLIEDIS members have worked together to develop a CITS implementation guide to transmit broker information from distributors to carriers has comp. Members can download the implementation guide and sample files by signing into the CLIEDIS website and going to the CITS Working Group page. For more information about CITS, go to the CITS Overview page.
CLIEDIS Welcomes New Members
Feb 09 2009 CLIEDIS is pleased to announce the following new CLIEDIS members in 2010: Desjardins Financial Security, MajescoMastek and Force financiere Excel.
CITS Inforce Phase 2 Begins
Nov 26 2008 CLIEDIS has begun work on Phase 2 of the Inforce Phase 2. Members attended an all day meeting in Toronto on November 20, 2008 to discuss scope issues. Work will continue into the new year to refine the scope and begin work on defining what specific information will be included in the Inforce2 feed. For more information, contact Julie Parrott (jparrott@cliedis.ca).
CITS Commission Data Implementation Guide Ready
Oct 09 2008 The first draft of the CITS Commission Data Implementation Guide is now available to CLIEDIS members for review. Training for this guide was held in November. Discussion continue on outstanding issues.
SPECIAL OFFER FOR LIFE AND HEALTH INSURANCE COMPANIES
Oct 08 2008 CLIEDIS is offering a limited time offer for Life and Health insurance companies. Join by December 31, 2008 for only $1,500 and enjoy membership privileges until April 30, 2009. If you were considering joining CLIEDIS, this is the perfect opportunity to find out about the benefits of membership: participating in CITS (Canadian Insurance Transaction Standardiziation) initiatives, low cost training, networking and seminars. To join, simply fill in the membership application by December 23, 2008 to receive this special offer. An invoice will be e-mailed to you.
CLIEDIS Website Revamp
Jun 29 2008 The CLIEDIS website has been updated to make navigation through the site easier and to enhance security for our members. You need to sign in to be able to access CLIEDIS member information. If you are a CLIEDIS member, you can register using your company e-mail address.
CLIEDIS Makes a Presence at the MGA Symposium
May 28 2008 CLIEDIS made a presence at the MGA Symposium in Collingwood, ON on May 27-29, 2008. CLIEDIS sponsored a breakfast and providing information to attendees on CLIEDIS and the CITS (Canadian Insurance Transaction Standardization) initiatives. Felinore Surat, CLIEDIS co-chair, spent time speaking with MGAs to get their input on CLIEDIS, CITS and electronic data transfers.
Best Practices Guide for Data Security
Apr 29 2008 A set of best practices has been developed for CLIEDIS members for data transmission security and password management. The guide is available on CAIR and on this website on the Standards Review Committee page. |
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