Property and casualty insurance specialist Portage Mutual has partnered with software provider Guidewire on the deployment of a new online platform that will speed up the claims management process in the insurer’s personal, agricultural, and small business lines.
The Manitoba-based insurer has implemented the ClaimCenter platform in all lines of business at each of its regional offices, completing the first phase of its Legacy System Replacement strategy.
“User feedback about ClaimCenter has been positive, highlighting the system’s easy navigation, reduced training time, and ready access to client information,” said John Mitchell, president and chief executive officer of Portage Mutual. “Our strategy was to stay as close to out of the box as possible, only making changes when it was essential to our business. That strategy was instrumental in completing the project on time and significantly under budget.”
IT firm CGI, a Guidewire PartnerConnect consulting member, will host the product on its cloud platform.
Portage Mutual also selected new systems for policy administration and underwriting (PolicyCenter), billing (BillingCenter), and client data, rating, and reinsurance management, which will all run using the InsurCloud cloud platform accelerator from Deloitte, another PartnerConnect consulting member. With these selections, the company becomes a full InsuranceSuite customer.
DataHub and InfoCenter, meanwhile, will serve as the insurer’s enterprise-wide data management and business intelligence systems.
Portage Mutual will be following the same strategy in implementing these products as ClaimCenter, making only those changes that are essential to run its business.
“The implementation of PolicyCenter and BillingCenter will complete the second of our three-phase Legacy System Replacement strategy,” Mitchell said. “The final phase will involve transitioning from our legacy back-end financial and reporting system to Datahub. Once all of our data is transformed into DataHub, our data management capabilities and insights will be significantly enhanced. These new systems will enable us to improve our ability to compete in an evolving market.”
Mike Polelle, chief delivery officer of Guidewire congratulated Portage Mutual on what he called a “significant milestone in its evolution.”
“We applaud the company’s commitment to providing its policyholders with financial security for their assets and look forward to working with the customer and its partners to deliver the cloud foundation for its future,” he said.
