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Insurance carriers and national brokerages that issue Certificates of Insurance through their service centers face many of the same problems as other entities involved in the delivery chain, except their difficulties are compounded by the sheer volume of certificates they are required to process. If inefficiencies exist in their issuance process due to lack of systems integration or design, the added costs associated with those inefficiencies are repeated every time a certificate is issued - they simply don't disappear.

To put this into perspective, several studies have concluded that when a certificate is issued through most currently available certificate systems, the labor and equipment costs average from $4.00 - $7.00 for just a simple, plain-vanilla type of certificate. If additional wording or a specific endorsement(s) needs to be attached, the cost easily doubles or triples. Further, other studies show that the average cost for mailing an envelope is not thirty-nine cents, but two dollars and fifty cents. When multiplied by the number of certificate documents mailed every day, you arrive at a staggering figure. Using eCertsONLINE reduces the issuance cost of even the most complex type of certificate by 60% - 70%, and if customer self-service is provided, the overall savings increases to 80% or more.

CURRENT SYSTEMS

Most management and legacy systems that are being used to issue certificates were actually built to manage accounting, policy maintenance, and application functions, and overall they do an excellent job of this. However, the certificate function is not the same as repetitiously typing a few lines of data onto an insurance form, yet that is how most systems are programmed. This is not a criticism of those systems, only a factual analysis - they were never designed to perform more than only a small portion of a very complex and sophisticated process. eCertsONLINE eliminates these shortcomings since it possesses the power to deliver unparalleled performance throughout the entire spectrum of extreme usage. Due to it's symmetry of design and function, it defines a new standard of programming excellence by focusing technological resources specifically on simplifying the many complexities of the certificate issuance process. That's what it was built to do.

Another added benefit of using eCertsONLINE is immediately achieved by those organizations that have acquired other operations over time and as a consequence, their branch locations are now using a myriad of automation systems each with dissimilar and often inadequate certificate processing capabilities. Rather than scrapping existing systems, eCertsONLINE's automated capabilities instantly become available nationwide, and this serves to standardize this most important process while completely avoiding the inordinate cost and inconvenience of changing management systems.

In addition, customers that are national or multi-national present an additional challenge due to time zone differentials, and the potential delivery of certificate documents across the globe. Customers with foreign operations generally have the same immediate need for the delivery of certificates as domestic companies yet few systems currently have the capability to conveniently accommodate these types of situations.

SOLUTION

With the eCertsONLINE program designed for high volume, single or multiple location service center operations, these problems can be solved quickly and easily without the need for expensive IS development since:

• eCertsONLINE is entirely browser based so there is no software to install or maintain
• Web hosting is provided by a Tier 1 provider with redundant power generators, 24x7 security guards, and multiple daily back-ups
• All functions within the program are completely integrated
• Once and done processing eliminates multiple handling of documents
• eCertsONLINE is database driven so all documents are attached and automatically print at the time of issuance through both the new and renewal processing cycles
• The program is web based and can be deployed globally in a matter of minutes without the costs normally associated with other enterprise solutions
• Customer data is available to multiple service centers that may service the same account
• Available 24x7 from anywhere in the world, customers can self-serve their own certificate needs but only with the specific approval of the service center
• Worldwide electronic delivery eliminates mailing costs and is the least expensive method of document delivery ever devised. Delivery via Fax, U.S. Mail, or Next Day Air is also available
• Renewal processing is accomplished with a few clicks of the mouse

Of course, we recognize that there are a myriad of other unique operational requirements as well as problems faced by service centers that are too numerous to address here. There are also numerous other creative solutions available exclusively to eCertsONLINE that we also choose not to mention.

INCREASED PRODUCTIVITY

Due to its integrated design, eCertsONLINE significantly increases employee workflow and productivity. What may normally take 12-15 minutes with most certificate systems only requires 2-3 minutes with eCertsONLINE and by gaining efficiency, fewer employees are required to accomplish the same amount of work while substantially improving overall customer service. In these difficult times when the pool of qualified employees is shrinking and those that are available command a hefty premium, doesn't it make sense to reduce your dependency on additional personnel and decrease overall expenses, while simultaneously increasing your profits? We think so too, and that is another reason why eCertsONLINE is a "can't lose" situation for any company that uses it.

SYSTEM INTEGRATION

eCertsONLINE can accept data uploads from most management systems including legacy systems. This includes AL3, SQL, DBase, Excel or ASCII delimited just to name a few. Customer, policy, and certificate holder data can be safely imported into eCertsONLINE making the transition into this web based program easy and painless. And, in many instances, we can also import all of the Certificate data too including policy numbers, effective and expiration dates, limits, etc.

Further, we have other routines available that refresh policy data on a daily or even real time basis thereby ensuring that the information within the system is always current and accurate. Whatever your upload needs may be, eCertsONLINE can accommodate your specific requirements.

CUSTOM FORMS & PROGRAMS

Although eCertsONLINE supports ACORD based Certificates of Liability Insurance, we realize that some carriers utilize their own specific form or format. eCertsONLINE can also program customized forms to meet your individual needs. Further, similar to the Certificate of Liability Insurance, the same processing difficulties exist for sending certification of coverage to mortgagees or loss payees on property risks. For that reason, we have integrated the Evidence of Commercial Property form into the program so that property coverage verification can also be processed much in the same manner as the Certificate of Insurance.

BRANDING

The eCertsONLINE web site that your service center staff and customers utilize should be elegantly designed and reflective of your corporate image. For that reason, each page is branded with your company name and tag line. However, eCertsONLINE is also the only site of its type that includes the capability to change the coloring of the background, menu, titles, and links to match the custom colors of your own web site, and incorporate your company logo on every page. This level of customization is available at no cost as part of the eCertsONLINE site set-up.

TRAINING

Although eCertsONLINE is highly intuitive and logical in its sequencing of functions, we provide your staff with the necessary training to make a smooth transition to this dynamic system. In addition, an Admin Manual is also provided that outlines all of the program functions in detail. This easy to read pictorial guide is written in plain English and takes all of the guesswork out of the site operation. A complete User Manual is also provided for those customers that will be self-servicing their own accounts.

SITE OPERATION

Once the site is established, the service center's staff login to the Admin side using a secure password and User ID that determines one of three levels of security. Once the customer's account and Master Certificate(s) are set-up, staff members may add an unlimited number of Certificate Holders and issue certificates, attachments, and endorsements on demand.

At the time of issuance, the completed documents including any endorsements or attachments can be sent to the Certificate Holder via e-mail, fax, U.S. Mail, or Next Day Air with copies automatically sent to the carriers involved. The service center may then optionally print their copies to a local printer and/or long-term archive completed copies on our secured servers

If customer self-service is permitted for specific insureds, they would have access only to the User side via a secure password and User ID that determines one of four (4) levels of security. The customer may only view and issue those specific Master Certificates designated by the service center by adding the appropriate Certificate Holder information. Once a Master Certificate has been set-up it cannot be modified or altered by the customer except if authorized by the service center, the GL and Excess Limits may be reduced (see Reduced Limits).

ENDORSEMENTS

The Endorsement function is one of the major time-savers available to users of eCertsONLINE. When additional insured status or a Waiver of Subrogation is permitted by the insurance contracts and acknowledgement is being provided to the Certificate Holder, it only makes sense that you should also have the capability to attach an endorsement since additional insured wording in the Description of Operations section of the Certificate is meaningless without the appropriate policy endorsement (see side 2 of the ACORD 25). Since endorsement maintenance is usually non-existent in most certificate systems, service centers are forced to manually complete the required endorsements for each individual Certificate in their word processor, a painful and time consuming process.

In eCertsONLINE, the endorsement function is fully integrated. This permits endorsements to be attached to the Certificate with a simple click of the mouse. Once attached, the insured name, policy number, and certificate holder information pre-fills to the endorsement. This information is also dynamically updated if, for example, the policy number or Certificate Holder address is changed at the time of renewal. Upon issuance, the Certificate, endorsement, and any attachments are automatically printed and may be sent to any number of recipients via e-mail, fax, or U.S. Mail.

Although eCertsONLINE provides an extensive library of standard endorsements, we’ve also built in the capability to create, upload, and maintain your own customized library of endorsements whenever you need them. More than 25 different fields of data can be placed onto the custom endorsements including the policy number, insured name, certificate holder’s information, and a digitized signature. In a matter of minutes, your custom endorsement is ready to use. This is critically important especially at the time of renewal when a revised or updated endorsement is adopted for use.

REDUCED LIMITS

This feature is designed for those insureds that do not wish to have their full limits of coverage shown on their Certificates of Insurance due to contractual terms with a specific certificate holder. In order to accommodate these larger clients, current certificate systems require the creation of several Master Certificates each with differing limits of coverage, and that tends to be administratively cumbersome and prone to error. To overcome these inefficiencies, the Reduced Limits function was developed.

At the time a certificate holder is added, additional fields will appear that display the current limits on the Master Certificate for both General Liability and Excess. In the fields immediately adjacent are input fields that only allow limits that are equal to or less than the limits displayed on the Master. At the time of Certificate issuance including renewal, the reduced limits will print in the appropriate fields on the completed Certificate. This completely eliminates the necessity of maintaining numerous Master Certificates for an insured.

The use of the Reduced Limits feature is strictly controlled by the service center and may be toggled on or off based on the needs of the particular customer.

MULTIPLE NAMED INSUREDS

Another unique feature that is available in eCertsONLINE is the Multiple Named Insureds function. This was developed principally for use with larger insureds with multiple entities and locations that require each individual entity’s name and address to be shown in the Insured section on a completed Certificate of Insurance. This feature permits the service center to set up a single Master Certficate including all named insureds rather than a separate Master Certificate for each one as is necessitated by most management systems.

When this feature is utilized particularly when it is combined with the Reduced Limits feature, it can reduce the number of Master Certificates on larger accounts from hundreds to a mere handful. Aside from simplifying the day-to-day maintenance of these types of accounts, just think of the time savings at renewal when all of the Certificates for all entities can be issued with just a few clicks of your mouse!!

CUSTOMER SELF-SERVICE

Admittedly, self-service is not for every customer. However, for those with the proper infrastructure and expertise, self-service does make sense. After all, in many instances these same customers have been sending fax requests to the service center outlining the specifics for their certificates and now with less effort, they can quickly and easily self-issue the actual documents whenever they choose thereby saving labor and handling, postage, and equipment wear and tear. By far, this is the most cost effective method of certificate issuance ever devised and the most convenient for the customer.

In addition, the agency also has the option of allowing customer self-service for only the simple, plain vanilla type certificates while leaving completion of those that are more technically complex to the agency's staff. In this way, completion of the mundane certificates that drive a significant portion of the agency's workload can be transferred online to your customers while also providing them with an important value-added service. This is in addition to simultaneously reducing your own internal processing costs.

Further, to eliminate the potential for error by the customer, we have included a preview capability that displays the entire document set on-screen. The customer may then double check for errors that may have occurred and make any necessary corrections prior to actual issuance. This is just one of several fail-safe mechanism built into eCertsONLINE.

APPROVAL MODE

If you still question the viability of customer self-service, we've taken this concept one step further by developing an Approval mode that can be used on a customer-by-customer basis prior to certificate issuance. Once the customer has added the proper certificate holder information, a complete copy of the actual certificate including any attachments and endorsements is immediately submitted to the service center where it is reviewed on-screen for accuracy. If acceptable, one click of the mouse approves and automatically notifies the insured that it is OK to resume the issuance process. If the certificate is not acceptable, the issuance process is terminated, and the customer is immediately notified of the reason. Once a certificate is rejected, it cannot be processed until the appropriate changes have been made, and the revised certificate re-submitted to the service center for approval. This entire approval process as described can be accomplished in less than a minute - we've made it that easy.

Further, the approval function is an ideal training aid for new users of eCertsONLINE since it may also be utilized for those customers who might simply feel uneasy with the overall certificate process. Conversely, it also permits the service center to feel secure that their customers are issuing certificates but only if the certificates have been specifically approved by the service center's professional staff. In either case, the Approval mode can be turned on or off with just a click of the mouse as the mutual confidence levels increase between the service center and the customer.

RENEWAL PROCESSING

The renewal process has traditionally been one of mixed emotions for service center operations. While excitement reigns due to the successful renewal of an account, the realization that hundreds or even thousands of renewal certificates need to be immediately issued can also create an atmosphere that borders on sheer panic. Issuing renewal certificates are essential to an insured's ongoing operations yet the customer's decision to renew their contracts generally seems to occur only at the last moment with the resulting chaos creating a major disruption in the normal workflow. Further, with larger accounts, the renewal function can take several days and require the energies of several additional staff members in order to complete.

When using eCertsONLINE, the process is simply a matter of updating the policy data and renewal listing to identify those certificate holders that are no longer required. This includes those certificate holders that have been flagged as "one-time only" during the course of the year. Then, with a single click of the mouse, eCertsONLINE issues all certificates, endorsements, and attachments automatically since it remembers what was sent, to whom, and how it was sent. What was previously measured in days has now been reduced to one person and a few clicks of the mouse - eCertsONLINE does everything else.

ARCHIVING

Archiving is a function that automatically stores any completed Certificate, Attachment, Endorsement, and Addenda. At the time the documents are issued, copies of the documents are stored on our secured servers and in the identical format in which they were issued. These documents may then be retrieved, viewed on-screen, or printed locally. Two separate Archives are automatically provided: "Forms Issued Today" and "Forms Issued This Month". All certificates issued during these timeframes are listed on-screen and may be retrieved and re-printed on demand with a click of the mouse. An optional long-term archive is also available that stores the completed documents for a period of ten years so that at any time in the future, these documents may be retrieved using a simple search routine. Use of this long-term archive function eliminates the filing and storage problems normally associated with the certificate process and permits immediate access to these critical documents long after most state statutory storage requirements have expired.

Further, when an insured requests a Certificate of Insurance via fax, e-mail, or in writing, eCertsONLINE can also store a copy of the actual request. At the time of issuance, the request is attached as the final page of the Certificate and stored in the Archive for a period of 10 years. This feature permits long-term retention of the insured's original correspondence including the terms and conditions requested. It is also consistent with the requirements of the new Federal Rules of Civil Procedure governing electronically stored information (ESI) that went into effect on December 1, 2006.

eCERTS ON CD

Another feature available is eCerts on CD. Since our long-term archiving function stores copies of issued Certificates for a maximum period of ten years, after that time the only available records of a specific Certificate would probably be those contained within your own paper files. And, aside from the condition of the document ten years hence, being able to locate it would be another matter entirely. For this and several other reasons we have developed eCerts on CD that stores an exact copy of every Certificate issued during the calendar year including any Attachments, Endorsements, and Addenda onto a searchable CD in a pdf format. The CD is completely self-contained, has the same look, feel, and work flow as the eCertsONLINE web site so no additional software is required. To locate a Certificate, you would simply place the CD into your CD drive, look-up the name of the Holder that is listed alphabetically, and click View/Print. The document(s) will appear on screen where it can be printed through your browser and in the identical format as at the original time of issuance.

This feature also solves another problem - storage. Let us assume that your company issues 100,000 Certificates a year, and those Certificates are a mixture of both simple and complex and average a maximum of only two pages each. That's 200,000 individual sheets of paper, and if they were neatly stacked and filed away, the storage requirements alone would be ten, four-drawer file cabinets. If you then add the cost of printing, equipment wear and tear, alphabetizing, and the cost of the file cabinets, the storage cost begins to escalate considerably, and this is only for one year. In comparison, the entire 200,000 sheets of paper can be stored into perpetuity on four (4) easy-to-use customized CD's.

We also utilize this same concept for the benefit of your customers. We can provide them with copies of their Certificates on CD at policy renewal, at the end of the calendar year, or whenever directed by you. Each CD is elegantly designed and customized with your company name and logo, the insured's name, and a description of the contents. This eliminates the printing, handling, and postage normally associated with mailing hundreds or thousands of paper Certificates to the insured and also eliminates their storage problems as well.

SECURITY

The security within eCertsONLINE is not just another function but is interwoven into the very fabric of the program:.

• Access to the program is controlled through a series of User ID's and Passwords. 
• Three levels of security are included on both the Admin and User side.
• Advanced 128 Bit encryption technology keeps confidential data safe and secure.
• Once a Master Certificate has been set-up by the service center it cannot be changed or altered by the customer.
• The service center can select which clients will be permitted to self-service their certificates.
• If self-service is permitted, the service center can specifically select those certificates the customer can issue.
• The service center controls if the client may input data of any type in the Description of Operations section of the certificate or may choose to have pre-determined wording automatically appear.
• The Approval mode permits the service center to review completed customer self-serviced Certificates and may either approve or reject them prior to actual issuance.
• Copies of all self-serviced certificates are automatically sent to the service center for review and immediate archival.

Overall security is taken very seriously not only to safeguard the confidentiality of critical data, but to also ensure that errors can be prevented from occurring in the first place.

IS ECERTSONLINE RIGHT FOR YOUR COMPANY?

Probably, but don't take our word for it - prove it to yourself. Using the chart below, determine the average cost per minute of your employees' time then use the follow this five-step process to determine if eCertsONLINE will work for you:

1. Review your current certificate process from top to bottom. Walk a certificate through your process from start to finish and examine precisely how every function is performed and by whom. How long does it take? What improvements if any, will make it more efficient?
2. Compute the time required to issue a simple certificate, and also those that are more complex. How long does it take to complete an addendum or endorsement in word processing and attach it to the Certificate? Multiply the time by the Cost Per Minute indicated above. In addition to the labor cost, also include such items as paper, envelopes, toner, postage, equipment wear and tear, IS programming and maintenance. This will provide you with an accurate baseline for any comparison
3. Make a "wish list". If we all lived in a perfect world and an absolutely perfect system was available, what would you want it to do and how would you want it to operate? Don't be shy with your suggestions. Some of the most seemingly bizarre recommendations have already become powerful time and money saving functions. Remember, if it is conceivable, it is probably programmable.
4. Compare the features described above with your current Certificate system. How does it measure up? Are you really getting the productivity gains you need?
5. Call us for an online tour - no obligations of course. It will be the most informative 30 minutes you have spent in a while.

While we cannot guarantee, nor for that matter can anyone else, that eCertsONLINE or any other "out of the box" program will meet all of your unique requirements, you will be pleasantly surprised how close to perfect it already is. And, perhaps with some tweaking or additional code, we can make it the absolutely right system for your company - you'll never know unless you ask. However, what we can guarantee is that eCertsONLINE will exceed your expectations. Count on it !!!

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