CCC Introduces Automated Claims Review Product

CCC Information Services Inc., a supplier of software and communication systems to the automotive claims industry, has introduced the Quality Advisor, a product that automates the auto physical damage claims review process. The company calls the product "a groundbreaking automated workflow management tool that allows claims adjusters, reinspectors and desk reviewers to decrease settlement cycle time, lower loss costs, and enhance the quality of collision damage estimates by identifying irregularities and errors in a claim before payment is made."

Many insurance companies evaluate estimate quality after the appraisal has been completed and often the audits occur after payment has been issued. Estimate audits are usually quality checked by desk reviewers who read and analyze each claim by hand. As a result, insurers may spend time on files with no aberrations and fail to review others with obvious problems. CCC claims that the Quality Advisor improves the productivity among staff that audit claim files, thereby increasing insurance companies' payment severity savings.

"Most often, errors in an auto damage claim--like accidental use of an incorrect labor rate--are not caught until after payment has already been sent to the consumer or collision repairer," said Karoline Obora, product manager at CCC. "With Quality Advisor, this problem is eliminated because the software verifies the accuracy of an estimate much earlier in the claims cycle. Quality Advisor helps reduce costs because it identifies any miscalculations or inaccuracies long before the claim is paid, and in many cases, before work on the vehicle has even been started.

"Manually reviewing 100 percent of estimates is often viewed as cost prohibitive," Obora continued. "Quality Advisor eliminates an outdated manual process, electronically scanning each estimate to identify errors and inconsistencies and enabling the claims reviewer to take corrective action before it is too late."

Quality Advisor consolidates all the estimate and supplemental information into one file to check rates, identify inconsistencies and verify that all the parameters included are consistent with the guidelines set by an insurance company. In addition to tracking and reporting on estimate quality for staff appraisers and direct repair shops, Quality Advisor also measures and reports on the productivity of staff performing the reviews.