CSC took to the stage of its annual conference in Marco Island, Fla., to announce the winners of its first Innovation Awards, developed to recognize innovation and leadership in technology and quality enhancement.
"It is with great pleasure that we recognize the first recipients of CSC's Innovation Awards, and we look forward to instituting these awards as a CSC tradition," says Michael Risley, president of the Life and Annuity division within CSC's Financial Services Group. "By improving their mission-critical operations by leveraging CSC software and outsourcing services, these award winners have established carrier best practices and demonstrated that innovation remains a strength of the life insurance and annuity industry."
Innovation in Global Sourcing Award
AXA Equitable received the Innovation in Global Sourcing Award, which singles out a carrier for achieving superior results using CSC's business process outsourcing (BPO) or information technology outsourcing (ITO) resources. The company expanded the scope of its offshore engagement with CSC, which was initially to provide maintenance production support for both CSC and legacy applications, to include enhancements, maintenance, production support, release management, quality assurance and business analysis for in-house AXA applications. As a result, teams now resolve 25% more maintenance tickets annually, cycle times have been reduced, and the carrier has launched 18 new life insurance products and seven new annuities.
Innovation in Policy Administration Award
The Innovation in Policy Administration Award was presented to three carriers that reduced expenses or improved productivity, revenues or customer service through a successful implementation, conversion or upgrade of CSC's policy administration systems. The winners were selected for their innovative use of three different platforms. MTL Insurance was chosen for its collaboration in the development of and early adoption of NextGen, leveraging new technologies with LIFE-COMM. Ohio National was recognized for its cost-effective implementation of VANTAGE-ONE for its term insurance business. Midland National and North American, of the Sammons Financial Group, were honored for their conversion of four policy administration systems onto CyberLife with a common front-end, Customer Service Accelerator. This effort was part of Midland National's and North American's corporate strategic initiative to consolidate and streamline business operations and the systems supporting those operations while laying the foundation for future growth.
Innovation in Producer Management Award
Conseco received the Innovation in Producer Management Award for its deployment of PerformancePlus as its strategic incentive compensation system for independent agents. As a result of the implementation, which consolidated platforms, the carrier was able to process commissions faster and cut IT support in half.
Exceptional Customer Service Award
Phoenix Life won the Exceptional Customer Service Award for its use of Customer Service Accelerator as its front-end application for seven systems. This implementation resulted in improved customer-facing interactions that have produced greater consistency, raised productivity, accelerated access to pertinent information and reduced errors. Customer service representatives have lowered the typical time spent handling customer calls by 15%.
