New systems enable new way of doing business

Investment Paid Back In Six Months

The P&C insurance company If Varakindlustus, an Estonian subsidiary of If, brought a new insurance management and sales system into production use on 1 April 2001. The project – named SamBa – saw the implementation of an integrated system for insurance sales and management, client management, and handling of the monetary transactions of private customers.

- In this project, we created an IT system that supported our new business procedures. We centralised our agreement and account management, and our entire sales and management process became much more effective. The changes from the previous working methods were huge, says Underwriting Director Mihkel Uibopuu from If Estonia.

His responsibilities at If Estonia cover product development and common business systems. In addition, he participates actively in project steering, as he did in the SamBa project.

The SamBa project was the most expensive system project ever carried out in If Estonia. However, the system paid for itself within six months.

Concentrating on core competence

According to Uibopuu, the project was started with another provider, but then an agreement was signed with Profit Software, in December 1999.

- At If, we work in the insurance business. We are not an IT company. We chose Profit Software because they have special products and know-how concerning the insurance business and they can adjust the systems to each country's specific needs, says Uibopuu.

At the beginning of the project, there was a short period of getting oriented in terms of the co-operation methods. The demands of the insurance industry can vary greatly with specific circumstances, and therefore also systems need to be tailored a great deal on a country-by-country basis.

Rollout and initialisation of the system took one year. During that time, the information in the existing customer database, along with the new sales, was transferred to the SamBa system.

System work as required

According to Uibopuu, use of the system was complicated in the beginning and posed a challenge for employees. Uibopuu emphasises that when the employees are queried now, the use of the system is not considered complicated at all.

- The system works effectively, it is reliable, and it is exactly what we want and need. These are the major advantages of the system. The project is a fine example of how a good partner can be trusted and how challenges can be overcome, states Uibopuu.

Mihkel Uibopuu
Underwriting Director
If Varakindlustus