Online Agent Appointment System Launched for Universal American Financial Corp. (UAFC) by IdeaStar

An online agent appointment system for Universal American Financial Corp. (UAFC), headquartered in Rye Brook, NY, was recently launched by IdeaStar Inc. to improve the insurance agent enrollment and appointment process.

Cleveland, OH (PRWEB) August 16, 2006 -- With an eye toward improving the insurance agent appointment process, IdeaStar Inc. recently launched an online agent appointment system for Universal American Financial Corp. (UAFC), headquartered in Rye Brook, NY.

UAFC(http://www.uafc.com/)is a specialty health and life insurance holding company which provides a portfolio of asset accumulation, asset protection and senior care service products for today’s senior population.

IdeaStar,(http://www.insurance-technologies.com/) based in Cleveland, OH is a full-service Web development firm which designs, programs, promotes and manages leading-edge Web sites and e-business applications for the insurance industry.

There are several subsidiaries under the UAFC umbrella, each having multiple products and varying state authorities. Mike Wise, IdeaStar Vice President of Insurance Technologies, said the client and its distribution are excited about the new process. “It currently takes too long to complete agent approval and problems abound with incomplete paperwork. With the new online process, agent information can be submitted and processed in two to five days,” Mr. Wise said. “UAFC chose IdeaStar to develop the online agent registration system because of our depth of experience with other clients (http://www.insurance-technologies.com/case-studies.aspx). The online process is likely to become the only way an agent can become appointed or contracted to sell UAFC subsidiary products.”

“IdeaStar has completed several online agent registration processes (http://www.insurance-technologies.com/products/agent-recruiting-systems.aspx) for other clients,” Mr. Wise said. “However, insurance carriers inevitably need things to work a little differently than another client. Thus, flexibility in programming the business rules for each client is critical. Because we can quickly develop customized versions, time-to-market and developments costs are extremely competitive.”

The initial launch of the online agent registration process for the UAFC subsidiary, Pennsylvania Life, was July 31, 2006. David Burke, VP Agent Licensing at UAFC couldn’t have been more pleased with the development and launch of Phase One.

“Agents serving the senior market are rapidly becoming more tech-savvy. We need to be in a leadership position in offering agents Web-enabled, e-signature-based tools that make it easier to do business with us, especially in light of the cross marketing of products within UAFC and the need to address multi-company appointments and contracting.” Mr. Burke said.

“IdeaStar performed flawlessly in launching this high-profile, high-quality, online system within a fifteen-week period,” he added. “We now provide our PennLife agents the ability to complete contracting documents for up to 12 different programs. We are also in a position within the next 2 weeks to launch programs for our other career company, Pyramid Life, as well as our brokerage distributions.”

A full-scale roll-out is scheduled for later in the third quarter, Mr. Wise said. The process includes e-signature and integration with the back-end agent administration system. Furthermore, the system includes background checks on agents and other agent appointment screening processes required by many states, as well as automatic feeds to a third party to confirm the agents’ state licensing details.

“UAFC is a leading-edge thinker in the senior market,” Mr. Wise said. “The company knows the wisdom of more online functionality to meet the coming insurance demands of the baby boomers.”

For more information, contact:

David Burke, UAFC VP Agent Licensing and Commissions, 407-995-8000 ext. 8440

Mike Wise, (http://insuratech.blogspot.com/) IdeaStar Vice President of Insurance Technologies, at 216-674-1600 ext. 116.

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