Tech support

Most people are at least familiar with the concept of laptop and online enrollments, but there's more to cutting- edge technology in the benefits industry than the latest fancy online enrollment program. The tools brokers use to drive business are upgraded constantly, often evolving more quickly than the brokers themselves. Keeping up with the technological tools that can help increase efficiency and, in turn, the bottom line, can not only help brokers keep pace with the competition, but maybe provide a competitive advantage, as well.

Three Benefits Selling Expo participants from the technology panel weigh in on what carriers are doing and brokers can expect.

Benefits Selling: What should brokers and carriers be doing -- technologically speaking -- for each other to improve working relationships and the efficiency of delivery of insurance products and services?
Karla Schacht: We should all be focusing on innovative means of creating, streamlining and simplifying processes dedicated to driving exponential levels of efficiencies in the delivery of insurance products and services.

This will pay off in huge dividends for brokers and insurers alike.

BS: What technology trends are happening at the carrier level that brokers need to know about?
KS: While cost reduction is always a priority, technology continues to transition toward more strategic uses. We see it as an enabler for everything, including product innovation, speed to market, world-class service with ease and simplicity of use, and 24-hour availability provided across a variety of channels.

BS: What technological challenges do carriers encounter when working with brokers?
KS: Technological challenges that could be reasonably encountered, at any level of collaboration for two parties, would encompass integration of systems and data, diverse business processes and varied infrastructure architecture.

BS: What are carriers doing to address and possibly resolve technological challenges brokers have with them?
KS: I've always found that forging strong, collaborative relationships focused on common goals is the best approach for making significant, meaningful headway through any type of challenge, whether related to technology or not.

BS: How can brokers improve their profit margins via the technology available from insurance carriers?
KS: Brokers and insurers working closely on common goals with common expectations will achieve the largest return in this area.

Once the common goals and expectations are defined, it's a matter of defining priorities, scoping the effort, creating a plan and implementing it with strong ongoing metrics and measurements.

BS: What technological changes are on the horizon that brokers need to prepare themselves for?
KS: Technology will continue to be used in new and innovative ways. It's proven to be leveraged for attaining efficiencies, cutting costs, enabling collaboration and delivery of products and services in ways never imagined before. As our industry continues to embrace this, participants on every level will find more opportunities.

BS: What would insurers like to see brokers doing more of, or better, in the technology field to improve relationships and the smooth conduct of business?
KS: In the end, we all want the customer to be satisfied and confident they made the right choice with the products and services he receives. The closer the broker can get to the needs of the customer and the more transparency that can be provided, the better for all of us.

BS: What must brokers do to stay up-to-date technologically? What can they do technologically to get ahead?
KS: These days, it's hard to escape technology. It's in homes, schools and the workplace. The best ways of staying up-to-date are trying new things, learning from others, research and keeping abreast of trends through publications.

BS: How can brokers improve their service to their clients via the technology available from insurance carriers?
KS: The possibilities for improving service to clients via technology are endless. New innovations are announced daily. The important consideration is to have a shared vision and a plan with manageable milestones for accomplishing it.

Benefits Selling: Why have brokers in this industry been so reluctant to embrace technology as a way of improving the way they do business?
Robert Diorio: Brokers and enrollment companies have always known that the most effective selling tool for voluntary benefits has always been personal communication, typically through face-to-face enrollment. To be effective in selling voluntary products requires that employees be educated on the benefit of the product and ensuring that [the product] can be related to their specific circumstances. Brokers originally might have been reluctant to replace that sales method with any form of technology, fearing that they would lose that personal interaction, and possibly decrease sales effectiveness.

BS: How -- and why -- is that changing?
RD: Over the last five years, technology has changed the way business is done today. More and more cases today are being enrolled electronically via laptop enrollment, call centers and online enrollment. Brokers now realize that technology actually can be used to enhance the communication process of educating employees on the value of voluntary products.

BS: Is there more to advancing technology in this business besides the obvious enrollment options?
RD: Yes. Besides all the benefits technology brings to the actual enrollment process, it also provides added values in other areas. Technology offers a way to provide things such as benefit communication and benefit statements.

Anything that the broker can do to assist the human resources department while simultaneously completing the enrollments is obviously beneficial to both parties.

BS: What are some of the more exciting advances on the horizon?
RD: I think we will continue to see more use of the Internet and Web portals in the future. Maybe not for the actual enrollment process, but with things such as Web portals, employees can access them to review existing benefits, check plan details, etc. It is going to be something that every employer will want to offer -- not just the larger companies. Also, there is a push to make these Web portals all-inclusive with such things as the employee's investment information and retirement plan information, making the site more the employee's financial center, not just an insurance center.

BS: How have the carriers helped advance the use of technology in the benefits industry?
RD: The carriers themselves have been instrumental in advancing the use of technology in the benefits industry. Now, health carriers are moving into the forefront of Web-based technology for things such as core enrollment. Granted, the core enrollment process lends itself to that technology better than voluntary products. And health carriers are trying to standardize the process with things like the ANSI 834 format.

Voluntary product carriers also are using technology to provide not only electronic application systems, but many also include added-value features such as benefit communication and the ability to show the value of other employer-provided benefits.

BS: How does the higher tech way of doing business improve relations with carriers and employers?
RD: Obviously the goal of technology is to improve the way business is done and to make the whole process easier, less costly and less time-consuming. The technology in place today is meeting all those goals and provides the framework for improved relationships between the carriers and employers because it eliminates many of the obstacles that used to stand in the way of a good relationship between them.

Benefits Selling: Why have brokers in this industry been so reluctant to embrace technology as a way of improving the way they do business?
Ron Stone: The brokers in this arena need to be broken into at least two segments: one, brokers with cases of substantial size (more than 100 groups, but mainly larger than 250 groups), where the broker seeks to gain the employer's support to meet with all employees on the job in individual interviews, and usually uses fee-paid enrollers.

Second, brokers who deal mainly in the small-case market, usually with commission-paid enrollers, and gaining the human resource department's acquiescence to see the employees, but not the mandate to see them all; therefore, a voluntary enrollment.

In the first group, we would find a high percentage of brokers who use current technology for their enrollments -- laptop-based enrollment. And, they would use carriers that have their own computer enrollment systems and also can support others. This group also has built its offices around electronic enrollment and will absolutely refuse to conduct paper enrollments.

The second group is comprised of traditional-style voluntary benefit enrollments in, generally, smaller groups, where a commissioned agent is assigned to an account in which that agent tries to gain access, in whatever ways possible, to see employees, on or off the job. Paper is still widely used by these folks and the applications come in piecemeal and get underwritten and issued in an ongoing time frame.

Many of the players in this market just don't have the inclination, or need, to change and are concerned about the need for enroller retraining and internal staffing to include technological know-how, with attendant expenses.

BS: How -- and why -- is that changing?
RS: It already has changed in the large-case market. In the small-case market, it will change when the carriers demand a transition away from paper.

BS: Is there more to high technology in this business besides enrollment?
RS: There certainly is, especially in the areas of administration and policyholder service. A technologically advanced carrier that can give Web-based access to the policy records and can demonstrate an advanced method of supporting premium billing and acceptance can make a huge difference in the decision-making of the first group of brokers I mentioned earlier.

BS: What are some of the more exciting advances on the horizon?
RS: For many years, we have awaited the day when the technology has advanced to the point where we can conduct live, real-time visual enrollments from remote locations, just as a security alarm company conducts its business.

In other words, we could staff a room full of enrollers in Miami who could be working multiple cases at the same time. The enroller would sit in front of a screen armed with a camera, and conduct a live interview with an employee sitting in front of a similar set-up in Arlington, Texas. The quality of the interview could be monitored as never before, and the enrollment expense would be absent the cost of traveling, housing and feeding enrollers.

BS: How have the carriers helped advance the use of technology in the benefits industry?
RS: Several have led the way in the development of laptop-based systems and have created incentives for broker field use, with significant success in moving the technology ball down the court for that first group of brokers.

BS: How does the higher tech way of doing business improve relations with carriers and employers?
RS: For starters, enroller errors are reduced dramatically after proper training and some field experience.

And, second, additional work by the employer's payroll staff is reduced to a minimum if the reconciliation of premium bills can be eliminated by forwarding the deduction reports and amounts to the carrier for credit to each policy. Third, underwriting and policy issue occurs much more expeditiously due to the reduction in errors and the need to translate handwriting. And, finally, commissions can be processed more efficiently.