IIAA'S Yates Believes Technology Gives Strategic Opportunities
Jeffrey M. Yates, senior executive vice president, Independent Insurance Agents of America, Inc. (IIAA), has told industry representatives and vendors that the SEMCI vision remains critical to the Independent Agency System and that new technology allows achievement of the vision in unanticipated and unlimited ways.
"We need to view technology as giving us strategic opportunities because this is exactly how our competitorsbanks and direct response companiesare using it," says Yates, who addressed nearly two hundred industry, company and vendor reps at the Alliance for Productive Technology's (APT) Third Annual SEMCI Conference in Newark, NJ this month. "And we need to use this new technology to amplify the benefits that the Independent Agency System offers above and beyond other distribution systems." SEMCI stands for Single-Entry Multi-Company Interchange.
While technology is rapidly increasing the opportunities to achieve SEMCI, Yates says, it does not change the issues that SEMCI addresses for agents, companies and consumers. "SEMCI, in its broadest sense, is a vision that encompasses several things: It relates to agency workflow, not specific technology; applies to commercial as well as personal lines; allows single entry of data by whatever source and then the free movement of that data between the agency management system and all other applications, as well as multiple company systems; encompasses all types of transactionsnot only upload and download, but also endorsements, billing inquiries, claims processing, quoting, rating, software downloads, etc…; looks beyond just agency-company transactions to include electronic connectivity with the client; and contemplates that each agency employee is Internet-enabled and capable of e-mailing necessary, unstructured data from a client file to multiple companies and back."
Yates says that SEMCI will become increasingly important to companies' and vendors' competitive positions as agents become more technologically enabled. "Agents are increasingly looking at their workflow and evaluating whether the particular vendor or company technology enhances or hinders their efficiency," he says. "Proprietary approaches are fast becoming obsolete. SEMCI is real, it is here today and it will help bring needed efficiencies to our industry."
"While agents have been frustrated by the slow pace of SEMCI in the past, I believe positive progress will start to snowball over the next twelve months. I am very encouraged by the acceleration of SEMCI activity," Yates says.