SOFTware is HARD

This is a simplified diagram that captures the business process for a Life Insurance new business workflow. The high level process is captured using an UML Activity Diagram.

Chanced upon a website that lists out how to create an insurance quotation website that is customer-centric. Salient points are: Allow for the "human touch" where necessary. That is, have a live chat feature. Instead of pushing for the most expensive coverage, promote a list of coverage options (e.g. basic coverage, premium coverage, etc.) with the associated pricing. Alternatively, incorporate a name-your-price feature that calculates the equivalent coverage for the premium the customer is prepared to pay. Offer discounts during the quotation process! Make data entry easier. E.g. entering postal code could pre-populate the address. For existing customers, the application could pre-fill some related information associated with the customer. Allow for users to perform partial save in order to continue the quote at a later point in time.

Some points I made while considering whether TIFF or PDF format is more appropriate for the above. Need to differentiate the processing for: Records “born” electronic – use acrobat distiller to convert to PDF Scanned records – use acrobat capture to convert to PDF, use OCR to convert to text Paper-based records Archival workflow Document creation Document editing and annotation Tagging and metadata capturing Store and retrieve Print and distribute PDF/A is based on PDF Reference 1.4 (Acrobat 5) and has the following constraints Self-contained: All fonts used have to be embedded & external content references are disallowed Device-independent: Colour must be device-independent and transparency is disallowed Self-describing: XMP (eXtensible Metadata Platform) is required Unfettered: Encryption and LZW compression are disallowed Multimedia, forms, embedded files and JavaScript are disallowed PDF over TIFF More compact. I.e. smaller file size Metadata can be stor...

Some links to using iPad for the enterprise/ insurance http://www.insurancenetworking.com/issues/13_8/ipad-as-insurance-business-platform-ipad-as-an-insurance-business-platform-25560-1.html http://insurance-technology.tmcnet.com/topics/insurance-technology/articles/95402-insurance-provider-geico-announces-android-ipad-mobile-insurance.htm Apple enterprise program: https://developer.apple.com/support/ios/enterprise.html Enterprise provisioning profile deployment: http://developer.apple.com/library/ios/#documentation/NetworkingInternet/Conceptual/iPhoneOTAConfiguration/Introduction/Introduction.html#//apple_ref/doc/uid/TP40009505-CH1-SW1 Enterprise deployment: http://help.apple.com/iosdeployment-apps/ Links to iPad for eSignature http://www.silanis.com/solutions/insurance.html http://www.silanis.com/news/press-releases/2010/apple%E2%80%99s-ipad-to-propel-the-adoption-of-e-signatures-in-insurance-says-silanis.html http://tenonedesign.com/autograph.php http://www.immonline.co...