Title: Evaluating information management in an insurance company by simulation: a case study

Authors: Hongze Ma, Tuija Mantyniemi

Addresses: Logistics, Turku School of Economics, Rehtorinpellonkatu 3, FIN-20500 Turku, Finland. ' If P & C Insurance Company Ltd. (IF), Kalevantie 3, FIN-20025 IF Turku, Finland

Abstract: Information collection is one of the main operations in an insurance company. Normally, the company mainly concentrates on introducing advanced information technologies to achieve greater efficiency. However, the impact of applying such new technologies and the information management in an insurance company are rarely evaluated quantitatively. This may result in improper utilisation of the new technologies, and cause additional information cost. To improve the information management in the case insurance company If P & C Insurance Company Ltd. (IF), in this paper, a simulation model is built for the information flow of the claim-handling process. In this model, the following issues are studied: What is the resulting information cost and time when the company receives documents via different means? What is the significance if the company can reduce the amount of information received for handling a claim? By analysing the simulation results, suggestions on improving the information management in IF are provided.

Keywords: information management; performance evaluation; simulation; insurance companies; information technology; information flow; claims handling.

DOI: 10.1504/IJSOM.2008.015940

International Journal of Services and Operations Management, 2008 Vol.4 No.1, pp.56 - 71

Published online: 02 Dec 2007 *

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