One of the world’s largest insurers has divisions and business units across the globe. The company provides a full spectrum of insurance services – including an array of life insurance programs, pensions and affiliated savings options – for a broad client base.
A division of this insurance provider based in the USA had information on customers and policies contained in a legacy policy administration system. The information included term dates, policy numbers and customer contact information. To provide more responsive service, the division wanted to migrate the data to a new, cutting-edge policy management application.
The insurance provider had tried to implement similar data consolidations in other divisions. Due to inconsistent, unreliable or inaccurate data coming from legacy systems, the data transformation process was long, arduous and over-budget. The IT staff found errors or inconsistencies in the data only after trying to move data to the target, causing massive rework.
As the other business units of this insurance provider began data conversion projects of their own, this group learned from the mistakes of their sister divisions. They identified and rectified problems before loading the data into the new system – building better data that could more effectively drive the application.
The insurance selected a DataFlux data management solution that allowed both business and IT analysts to inspect, correct, integrate and enhance data. Through an easy-to-use, intuitive interface, DataFlux technology allowed the content owners (business staff) to serve as a key component during the transformation process. This lowered the overall workload on the IT staff and allowed the business users to stay involved throughout the process.
With DataFlux, staff members can use data profiling to find data errors, anomalies or inconsistencies within the source systems. Then, through the software’s integrated data quality technology, the analysts can build rules to standardize, validate, verify and match data from these legacy systems.
And since DataFlux can directly access legacy data in mainframe applications, the company had an option for accessing and profiling that data at the source before the migration process. This functionality in dfPower Studio allows users to analyze data where it resides without unnecessary file conversions, saving companies time and money on this critical first step.
With DataFlux in place, this insurance company was able to slash the time and resources required to migrate data from legacy applications to the new policy management system. Unlike similar projects that lasted well over one year, the data consolidation and transformation process took only a matter of months.
And in the process, DataFlux’s data management functionality allowed the company to find and address data errors before loading them into the new system. So, when the new policy administration application went live, it was filled with consistent, accurate and reliable information – the kind of data that the company can use to enhance their customer support and product offerings over time.