CGI Group Inc. (TSX: GIB.A; NYSE: GIB), in collaboration with two of the largest
insurers in the UK market, Norwich Union and Allianz Insurance, today announced
the launch of an Account Reconciliation Centre (ARC), a flexible web-based tool
that is set to make paper-based insurance account settlement a thing of the
past.
Provided as a managed service hosted by CGI and accessed via
imarket, the e-commerce portal, ARC has already proven itself during a six month
business pilot involving Allianz Insurance, Norwich Union and a range of their
brokers. Today, ARC is being made available to the wider broker community,
facilitating a transition from manual, paper based processes to an efficient,
fast flow of electronic information.
“ARC is an accounts settlement
system that has been developed in consultation with the industry, for the
industry – one that brings efficiency to the back office and tangible benefits
to both sides involved in the business process: insurers and brokers,” said Tim
Gregory, Vice-President, Insurance Sector, CGI.
ARC is being launched at
a time when insurers and brokers are under an ever increasing pressure to reduce
their operating costs. It is designed to transform the settlement of insurance
accounts between insurers and brokers – a process that has, until now, been
expensive and largely paper-based. By enabling automatic matching of all but the
exceptional items, ARC brings savings in both time and effort, dramatically
reducing the administrative burden associated with the traditional account
settlement process and allowing brokers to view all outstanding debt in real
time.
Donna Lovewell, Head of Collections, Norwich Union said:
“Throughout ARC’s development and pilot programme stages, CGI has incorporated
feedback from both insurers and brokers to ensure that the system does exactly
what we need it to – make our work easier and more effective.”
How it
works
ARC streamlines the account reconciliation process, providing
insurers with an up-to-date view of the status of brokers’ accounts and,
consequently, the progress of statement reconciliation. The system also improves
communication between brokers and insurers, leading to quicker query resolution
– an immediate benefit already observed by the pilot users. In addition, ARC
reduces the peaks and troughs of the monthly cycle, which means that insurers
and brokers can make more effective use of their time. Sophisticated enquiry
facilities, which include comments and audit trails, make the interrogation of
entries easier and reduce the dependency on individuals in the credit control
team.
Research carried out by CGI shows that up to 50 percent of
brokers’ time is spent on the reconciliation of items where the broker and
insurer already agree on what needs to be paid. ARC’s auto-matching
functionality virtually eliminates this problem, allowing brokers and insurers
to focus their effort on the items that need attention.
“The feedback we
have had on ARC from our credit control teams and the brokers participating in
the pilot programme has been overwhelmingly positive. Queries are getting
resolved quicker, and the communication between us and brokers has improved
greatly. ARC will bring significant efficiencies and cost savings to both our
and our brokers’ business”, said Chris Hanks, General Manager, Commercial
Division, Allianz Insurance.
-ENDS-
Note to editors
The pilot programme for the
Account Reconciliation Centre was carried out during Summer 2007 and included 21
brokers co-operating with Norwich Union and Allianz Insurance.
Selected user testimonials:
“Even though we are still in the
early stages and the process is bedding in, we have already seen huge benefits
that come from the earlier notification of queries – resulting in earlier
resolution and payment. We are also benefiting from improved communication with
our brokers. We are spending less time on the phone with brokers discussing
accounts – the time we devote to this is now much more focused on the items that
actually need discussing.”
Tim Bunce, Credit Management Manager, Allianz
Insurance
“The accounts reconciliation process has remained unchanged for
decades. ARC provides a first step towards automation.”
Greg Gladwell,
Director of Operational Services, Norwich Union Insurers
“ARC has
significantly streamlined the account reconciliation process at our end, making
the following month’s accounts much quicker and more efficient. This is mainly
due to the fact that we no longer have to repeat queries on unresolved items
month after month – all history of annotations is securely saved and, if need
be, brought forward to the next month.”
Julie Flynn, Operations Director,
Brokerbility
“ARC is bringing the insurance industry into the 21st
century, heralding an end to the traditional paper-based settlement process, and
making it more of a standard. At the moment, we work with 16 insurers and the
procedures we follow in account reconciliation are different for each of them,
and ARC will eliminate this completely.”
Emma Webster, Insurance Ledger
Supervisor, The Oval Group
Additional user testimonials are available on
request.
About CGI
Founded in 1976, CGI Group Inc. is one of
the largest independent information technology and business process services
firms in the world. CGI and its affiliated companies employ approximately 26,000
professionals. CGI provides end-to-end IT and business process services to
clients worldwide from offices in Canada, the United States, Europe, Asia
Pacific as well as from centers of excellence in North America, Europe and
India. CGI's annual revenue run rate stands at $3.7 billion and at September
30th, 2007, CGI's order backlog was $12.0 billion. CGI shares are listed on the
TSX (GIB.A) and the NYSE (GIB) and are included in the S&P/TSX Composite
Index as well as the S&P/TSX Capped Information Technology and MidCap
Indices. Website: www.cgi.com.
About Norwich Union
Norwich Union is the UK's largest insurer.
It is a leading provider of life, pensions and investment products and one of
the largest financial adviser (FA) providers. FAs provide over 70% of the
company's long-term savings business in the UK. Norwich Union is the UK's
largest general insurer with a market share of around 14%, with a focus on
insurance for individuals and small businesses.
About Allianz
Insurance
Allianz Insurance is one of the UK's leading general insurers
and part of the Global Allianz Group, one of the world's leading financial
services providers with a presence in more than 70 countries employing
approximately 168,000 people world-wide. The company is able to offer customers
a wide range of products including home, motor and a comprehensive portfolio of
commercial insurance solutions.
For press information, please
contact:
Artur Kwiatkowski / Janine Maxwell
ak@kinrossrender.com /
jm@kinrossrender.com
Kinross + Render
192-198 Vauxhall Bridge
Road
London
SW1V 1DX
Tel: 0207 592 3100
