With roots dating back to 1903, Harvard Western Insurance boasts a legacy of excellence in the insurance industry. With a team of 100 employees spread across 10 offices, the company recently acquired a brokerage, signalling a commitment to sustained growth. Harvard Western stands out for nurturing a team of skilled professionals and leveraging cutting-edge tools and strategies to improve productivity and provide top-notch service to clients. Understanding the importance of investing in employees' experiences, the company embraces new technologies to alleviate burdensome tasks, recognizing them as opportunities for advancement rather than mere expenses.

However, staffing shortages, manual processes, and time-consuming tasks posed challenges, hindering the delivery of optimal client experiences and contributing to staff burnout. These challenges impacted employee workloads, time available to interact with clients, and potential E&O risks due to manual processes. Harvard Western turned to Quandri to automate processes that were consuming countless hours of their valuable employees' time and ensure that they could keep up with their continued growth.
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Staff retention and the need to eliminate manual work

Despite a great work culture, Harvard Western faced challenges retaining staff in such a competitive environment. Staffing shortages, manual processes, and time-consuming tasks posed significant obstacles, impeding the company’s ability to facilitate meaningful client interactions and provide optimal coverage and support. They were in need of a solution to help their employees become more productive while preventing burnout.

With over 35,000 personal line policies, employees were frustrated by the considerable amount of time they wasted searching for and manually renaming documents. Even more burdensome was the laborious manual renewal review processes that created a substantial workload, preventing employees from focusing on value-adding activities. However, ignoring the renewal review process was not an option since it is extremely important for ensuring that policies remain relevant and adequately cover potential risks, while also providing opportunities to foster client relationships.

Harvard Western struggled for years trying to rectify the situation, including allocating various parts of the renewal review process across team members using the dreaded “checklist.” Besides their best efforts, the process remained laborious and the challenges persisted – leading to inaccuracies and the need for frequent rework. If there was one thing that the renewals team at Harvard Western could get rid of it was undoubtedly the renewal review checklist.

The amount of employees' time being sucked into the manual renewal review processes not only impacted staff productivity but also contributed to burnout. Advisors wanted to put their time toward nurturing client relationships rather than being entangled in repetitive tasks and reading through numerous pages of renewal documents. Consequently, these challenges impacted overall client experience and retention and Harvard Western was determined to find a solution.

Undergoing an operational overhaul

A turning point occurred for Harvard Western Insurance when Jessica Yelland, the Business Systems Manager, heard industry buzz about Quandri’s ability to revolutionize the renewal review process. Upon connecting with Quandri, and witnessing the team’s strong grasp of their company challenges, BMS, and operational pain points, Jessica recognized that this was finally the solution that they had been hoping for. Emphasizing the indispensable role technology plays in overcoming persistent challenges, Jessica stated, "There is no alternative to innovation - it's the only way to resolve problems that we've been dealing with for years."

Following Quandri’s implementation, employees were liberated from time-consuming, repetitive tasks, empowering them to focus on higher-value work. Advisors experienced remarkable relief from Quandri working behind the scenes for them, reducing their time spent on pre-call preparations by 75%, enabling more time for meaningful client interactions.

Without any prep work, advisors now effortlessly access a comprehensive client summary containing policy changes, missing information and coverage, and vital talking points derived from both the declaration page and BMS data. Harvard Western is able to reduce potential E&O risk to their book of business and optimize client interactions, ensuring clients receive the right protection, optimal coverage, and cost savings. “I’ve heard of situations where someone missed one line on a declaration page and it had a significant impact on a claim” said Jessica, “Quandri solves that problem.”

Results that speak for themselves

The adoption of Quandri resulted in dramatic benefits for Harvard Western Insurance. Notable outcomes included increased employee retention, a significant boost in satisfaction, time savings, improved client experiences, and a marked reduction in errors.

Advisors are now able to focus on the work that brings deeper value to the brokerage. Highlighting the transformative effect Jessica noted, "Employees experience reduced workload burnout and have time to focus on valuable, rewarding work, such as building relationships with clients - this is something that technology can’t do."

Quandri not only resolved operational obstacles at Harvard Western Insurance but also propelled the company towards a more dynamic, client-centric approach, showcasing the powerful impact of AI in the insurance industry.