How Digital Mailroom Improved This Client’s Existing Claims Handling Process

Storetec began working with a national claims handling company a number of years ago, forming a vital part of their claims handling process. This allowed the client to ramp up their volume and focus internal resources on other critical tasks.

Initially, the client diverted two different form types to Storetec for scanning. These included:

Credit Forms – Encompassing the first key stage of the claims process. These forms are completed by potential claimants and used to register their intention to pursue a claim by providing key details (e.g. name, address, date of birth, email address, previous names, previous addresses, previous/current lenders).

Letters of Authority – Forming the second stage of the claims process, these forms contain the client details obtained from the Credit Forms. The claimant must sign the Letter of Authority after checking the details and confirming that they are correct, or amending if necessary.

The client also diverted their general incoming mail to Storetec for handling and processing to digital images. This allowed all of the client’s employees to be allocated to the claims management process. The general mail incorporated various document types such as responses from banks requesting more information, confirmations of successful claims, abuse mail from unhappy recipients, payment information, accounting documentation and verification of unsuccessful claims.

Short Process Overview

1. Storetec receive all mail items by 9am each day.
2. Mail presort splits the mail into reply paid and postage paid mail.
3. Mail items are opened and sorted into their respective mail types.
4. The mail items are then prepared for scanning as per agreed client specification for each document type. This involves categorisation of the items based on completeness and exception handling procedures defined by the client.
5. The forms are then scanned, and quality checked before being released to the processing team for data capture.
6. Dictated by the categorisation and exceptions, the processing team capture data from each form, the amount of which is dependent upon the form completeness.
7. Captured data (metadata) is collated with scanned images and final output is generated.
8. Final output (images and metadata file) is checked and then transmitted to the client via SFTP.
9. Client reviews forms where necessary, based on completeness coding assigned by Storetec, and then triggers the next stage of the claims process.

Project Innovation

Whilst the mail volumes were initially low, the client aimed to increase the throughput of claims in advance of the impending PPI deadline to maximise the number of successful claim outcomes.

Operating on a 48-hour SLA for all work, Storetec helped the client to focus less on form capture and validation and focus more on increasing their capacity for processing claims internally.

The outsourcing services that Storetec provided subsequently led to a dramatic increase in claim applications leading to a significant increase in paperwork, and therefore scanning and data capture. Moving into the months leading up to the PPI deadline, it became apparent that the demand for claims was going to exceed the physical capacity of the client to process the claims, risking claims missing the deadline and therefore leaving the client open to claims against themselves.

At this point, Storetec approached the client with a solution that would allow more claim forms to be processed in an even shorter period, delivering a substantially increased overall capacity. The solution involved the development of a workflow by Storetec that would allow the claimant to bypass the postal process. Once a form is completed by the claimant’s signature, they email it to a central inbox which automatically uploads it to MDI Cloud, and the data from pre-defined fields is captured. The image and data are then routed through to the relevant personnel for action.

Storetec prioritised the workflow development and within three weeks had a working and tested workflow ready for use by potential claimants. The client began marketing and utilising it alongside the standard paper-based process and immediately saw a significant increase in the throughput of potential claims. As the volumes increased and deadline day approached, Storetec made further enhancements, agreeing with the client to place the focus on automating the most time-consuming aspects of the process. This allowed a scaling back of the normal work on exceptions, whilst still ensuring the integrity of the core process.

Running the workflow alongside the standard process, in addition to the enhancements that were made reduced the average claim processing time from 21 to 7 days. In the peak month of volume, August, Storetec processed over 600,000 mail items, averaging over 28,000 mail items per day. Following the PPI deadline, Storetec continues to process general mail items for the client, the main bulk of which are responses from the banks with outcomes to the claims.