PROFIDA Web Edition available at the IISA Annual Conference

Profida on cell phone

Financial software developers, the PROFIDA Team has announced that the latest edition of its market-leading system, the PROFIDA Web Edition, will be available to delegates and visitors at the 2009 conference of the Insurance Institute of SA (IISA).

The IISA Annual Conference is being held on 28 and 29 June at Sun City. The conference will focus on elements of “pride”: professionalism, research, insurance, development and education.

“PROFIDA Web Edition is the result of extensive research in the financial services administration and insurance industry,” says Daniel Putra, MD of the PROFIDA Team. “Our survey revealed that the industry employs insurance management systems either as a desktop or web-based solution, and that there was a need for a combined solution.”

This requirement was most apparent amongst underwriting managers, cell captives and administrators whose business models and future strategies involve the integration of call centre divisions, or the requirement to provide remote data access for brokers and policyholders.

These trends in the industry require that call-centre operators, brokers and policyholder need to have limited access to the same data sets as policy, claim, and money collection administrators. However, they have different requirements in terms of the user interface, usability and display of data.

“Brokers, policyholders and call-centre operators want to view a simple user interface, which allows data to be quickly accessed and serviced. A web-based solution is perfect for this purpose as it facilitates access via the Internet. However policy, claim and collection administrators, who perform more complex tasks, are looking rather for a full-featured interface which is found in desktop applications,” explains Putra.

With the seamless integration of web access within PROFIDA Software Solutions, these developments are catered for and the industry has the benefit of combined technology within PROFIDA Insurance Management Systems.

In practical terms, this means that if a claims administrator has installed the full-featured PROFIDA Desktop Application, and a broker located off-site logs on to the same platform via PROFIDA Web Access, he or she will be able to view data sets of specific relevance.

“This increases efficiency, improves communication and, as a result, standards of professionalism in the industry. At the same time it decreases the need to interface different software packages, each with their own maintenance needs”, says Putra

The PROFIDA Web Server is developed using the latest Java Enterprise Technology, with the PROFIDA User Interface available in Afrikaans and English.

With web-based solutions, data tends to be hosted off-site by the software provider, which could leave some underwriting managers and insurers uncomfortable in terms of data security and customer confidentiality. “This is why we give our clients the choice to either have their data hosted in-house or, if they prefer, on our servers”, says Putra.

Hosting in-house has great advantages, especially in terms of speed of access for in-house staff, which tends to be quicker than when hosted externally. It also gives control over data and back-ups.

Since 2000, the PROFIDA Team has been focused on software development in the financial services and insurance industries. The company boasts superior service levels, training and support, and a competitive pricing structure