NavRisk Case Study
Special District Risk Management Authority Integrates Core Systems, Increases Member Satisfaction and Reduces Costs
The Background
The Special District Risk Management Authority (SDRMA) is a California Joint Powers Authority that provides a full-service risk management program for California's local governments. For 25 years, SDRMA has provided members with comprehensive coverage protection for workers' compensation, general liability, public officials errors and omissions, employment practices liability, auto, property, boiler and machinery, crime and fidelity, and health benefits coverage. They have 580 member agencies, including 444 members in the Property/Liability Program, 360 members in the Workers' Compensation Program and 70 members in the Health Benefits Program.
The Challenge
Like many similar sized organizations, SDRMA had multiple software systems in place, each had a specific function and they all operated in silos. The disparate systems were not integrated and business processes relied on people to be the integration point, which produced costly errors. One such error, where SDRMA discovered that they had paid claims for organizations that were no longer part of the member pool, served as the catalyst to seek a solution to not just bridge these gaps, but close them. In addition, quarterly reporting to their Excess Carrier was a very tedious, time consuming process and prone to error.
The Solution
SDRMA has always been ahead of the curve with implementing technology as a means of providing the highest level of service to their members. They implemented DAVID Corporation's NavRisk Policy Administration and Underwriting software solution over 10 years ago, and the automation that the application provided helped SDRMA quickly realize significant cost reductions and increased member satisfaction. In 2009, SDRMA brought in The iFish Group, a business process and systems integration consulting firm, to audit their systems. The audit brought to light many critical gaps in business information workflow and the resulting analysis determined that the workflow gaps in their existing systems created numerous opportunities to introduce human error, especially with claims handling. SDRMA and iFish determined that a more integrated process driven software platform encompassing policy, underwriting and claims information would improve the accuracy and timeliness of the information. In addition, automating the reporting of key facts and statistics would significantly reduce staff time and would free up resources to provide a higher level of service to their members.
Upon evaluating several software solutions available in the market, SDRMA selected a combination of software strategies anchored by DAVID's NavRisk Claims and NavRisk Policy as the solution for achieving their goals.
The Results
Upon implementing the complete integrated NavRisk solution, SDRMA realized significant efficiency in daily workflow and user tasks. Adjusters are now able to instantly verify coverage for a claim without having to go into a separate system and/or rely on other staff members for confirmation of coverage. Coverage is automatically verified upon claim entry. Routine tasks such as managing reserves for specific types of claims and diary creation have been automated through the robust NavRisk Business Rules Engine (BRE) which also ensures that pre-defined workflows are enforced. SDRMA estimates that the automation of manual processes has resulted in a cost savings of $179.00 per claim. This savings has produced a significant positive impact on their overall operations budget.
SDRMA also implemented a data warehouse that enabled managers to instantly generate reports and perform analysis on claims, policy and financial data that previously took numerous staff hours to produce and were subject to human error. In fact, the quarterly excess report that used to take days to compile is now generated in a matter of seconds and helped the staff uncover a three year old billing error from their excess carrier that resulted in a $25,000 refund. By having all of their processes and data on a consolidated, integrated platform, SDRMA has streamlined access to information for both staff and members through their extranet portal. The portal facilitates publishing relevant reports and dashboards as well as providing member self-service features such as policy updates and renewals which has led to increased member satisfaction.
In a recent routine audit of the pool, auditors noted in their annual management report that SDRMA was operating much more efficiently than other pools of equal size. Currently SDRMA manages all pool administration including property and liability claims administration with a staff of 10 which is typically less than half the staff of other pools of equal size. SDRMA attributes this to the improvements in processes and workflows as a result of implementing the integrated NavRisk solution. With this infrastructure now in place, SDRMA anticipates that they would be able to double their membership with minimal impact to staffing and overhead.
"With the integrated NavRisk suite, we have improved our capabilities and efficiency and can now focus our efforts on providing the services that deliver the most value to our members and the board. We are excited that the solution has provided us with the means to retain our institutional knowledge through process driven systems and ensures sustainability of the operation. This efficiency translates into lower operating costs and lower rates to our members." Greg Hall, CEO of SDRMA
"During implementation, the DAVID, iFish and SDRMA teams closely collaborated to understand the current processes and workflow. Identifying the gaps was essential and as a result, previous manual tasks are now automated, preventing critical processes from slipping through the cracks, saving staff time, preventing costly errors and increasing client satisfaction." Frank Ono, President, The iFish Group
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