Special Advertising Section
Vertafore Offers Connectivity
and Rating Solutions
Dave Acker
of Vertafore
explains how B
est’s Review: The insurance industry has always been
competitive. What’s Vertafore doing to help customers
maintain their competitive edge?
aCKeR: Vertafore is developing tools for both agency
the company’s
management systems and connectivity to help insurance agencies
products are
do things faster and more productively so they can write and pro-
cess more business in less time.
making the BR: What kinds of connectivity and rating solutions does
insurance
Vertafore offer?
industry more
aCKeR: Vertafore offers a variety of connectivity and rating solu-
tions. These solutions include TransactNOW, which helps agencies
efficient. and carriers connect for items including inquiries and endorsements, Dave Acker,
PL Rating for real-time, multi-company rating, Downloads including
Vice President, Connectivity
Personal Lines, Commercial Lines and Direct Bill Commission State-
ment and Sircon, which offers an automated producer lifecycle man-
agement tool for licensing producers throughout the U.S.
BR: What kind of market traction have you seen for these solutions? “
Over the past
year we’ve seen
aCKeR: Over the past year we’ve seen an exponential growth
an exponential
in the usage of our TransactNOW and PL rating products—almost
growth in the
100% growth in year-over-year usage of those products. The trans-
actions that are flowing through our pipeline are now almost a
usage of our
million-and-a-half per month, and we just crossed the 10-million
TransactNOW
threshold in August for transactions year-to-date. We’re seeing the and PL Rating
proverbial “hockey stick” effect to our efforts on the connectivity
products—almost
side. Also, Sircon’s transactions with states, carriers and licensing
a 100% growth
providers are growing over 25% annually as well. I believe you’ll
in year-over-year
see Sircon’s transactions come into the connectivity mix with pro-
ducer lifecycle management in 2010.
usage of those
BR: Explain how connectivity rating solutions work within the
products.
”
management systems.
aCKeR: On the rating side, the information that’s in the manage-
ment system flows easily and seamlessly from any of our Vertafore
products into the multi-company rater. What’s important about that
is that once that information is integrated into PL Rating, it can be
submitted to the carrier. After new business issuance, the data moves
into our agency management systems through Download, the con-
nectivity product that we’ve been supporting for years. The ben-
efit to our customers is this lifecycle process for new and renewal
Listen to the
business, where data starts from the agency management system,
full interview
integrates to multi-company rating, flows up to the carrier and back
down to the agency management system in a seamless exercise.
BR: How have these solutions changed the game for agents?
aCKeR: For agents it has been the ability to do things more effi-
ciently and have the ability to work with their carriers in a seamless
fashion. Comparative rating especially has helped agents write new
business more effectively, and they can now compete with the direct
writers, which are completely bombarding the marketplace with
their advertising and message.
BR
n For the complete audio interview, visit www.bestreview.com/tech09.html.
Best’s Review Special Section 101
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