Hancock Automates Life App Process

Boston - John Hancock reports that it has enhanced its JH Illustrator software system, giving producers the ability to complete life insurance applications electronically. The company, which formulated this option based on building on an application wizard added to the software system last year, reports that, except for the producer and client's signature, it has essentially eliminated all handwriting from the application process. "Life insurance applications, especially at the higher end of the market, are complex, requiring numerous forms and a great deal of information," said Naveed Irshad, vice president of product management, John Hancock Life Insurance, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Canada-based Manulife Financial Corp. "Historically, much of this information has been filled in by hand. It was a time consuming task that we have all but eliminated. The only handwriting producers and customers will need to do is adding their John Hancock when they sign the application." He said John Hancock is committed to ensuring that doing business with the carrier is as easy and efficient as possible for producers and their clients. "Being able to enter data once by computer and have it pre-populate the rest of the application and then being able to type in any additional information will be an enormous time saver for producers," Mr. Irshad said, noting that the company is committed to additional investments to improve producer communications. After producers insert information in JH Illustrator for a policy illustration, this information automatically populates the appropriate fields on the life insurance application. The system also pre-selects and pre-fills supplemental forms that need to be included with the application. Once the forms are pre-filled, producers are prompted to save the application on their computer and fill in additional required information based on the case input directly within JH Illustrator. Unlike paper applications where the client needs to initial any changes, the enhancements let producers make and save changes neatly and quickly. In addition, because producers type in the information, the application that producers print out for the client's signature will be far easier to read. JH Illustrator also now includes an asset allocation option that allows producers to include a client's responses from a risk tolerance questionnaire and generates the appropriate asset allocation for the client's risk tolerance level and time horizon.  Sources: John Hancock Financial Services, PRNewswire