CLIENT OVERVIEW
Since 1947, Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho has provided a full range of insurance products to families, farms, and businesses. The largest property and casualty insurer headquartered in Idaho, it expanded into Washington in 2023 as Western Community Insurance Company, holds an A (Excellent) AM Best rating, and is a 2025 Best Place to Work in Idaho honoree.
BUSINESS CHALLENGE
In an effort to modernize and streamline its payment experience for policyholders and agents, Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho wanted to upgrade its aging payment platform, NEXUS, to a more agile platform that was integrated with its insurance core systems. The old platform was costly and provided limited functionality.
To bring customers a modern payment experience, Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho sought out an updated platform that offered a payment processing system, a payment status synchronizer, reporting functionality, notifications, and a messaging system to enable reliable messaging in a publish- subscribe integration model for future additions. After conducting a thorough search for a new platform, the insurer selected ACI Worldwide as its new payment system, largely due to its preexisting integration plug-ins with Guidewire Insurance Suite.
Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho wanted to develop a robust integration between its Guidewire core systems and the new payment system to ensure all payments were processed accurately. In addition, the insurer wanted the flexibility to waive or change fees as needed by making the logic behind the fees configurable. It was also important for payments to be allowed from multiple sources, including the insurer’s mobile app, its public website, the HUB website, and Guidewire PolicyCenter and BillingCenter.
SOLUTION OFFERED
When looking for a services partner to help it successfully decommission its old payment system and integrate the new one, Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho turned to its existing partner, ValueMomentum. Having successfully completed another project with the organization, the insurer knew that ValueMomentum had the necessary insurance knowledge and technical expertise to successfully modernize its payment system.
ValueMomentum worked with internal stakeholders as well as the insurer’s project management office team across the development, testing, and implementation phases of the project. ValueMomentum’s team partnered with Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho to successfully manage the insurer’s business requirements and implement the Guidewire and integration code changes needed to seamlessly integrate with ACI’s system.
As part of the initiative, ValueMomentum was responsible for the end-to-end development process, including the design and execution of comprehensive testing to validate all of the integration requirements. In addition, ValueMomentum worked closely with ACI to coordinate the deployment of changes across multiple environments, culminating in a smooth rollout. The project was completed in just over one year, commencing in September 2023 and going live in November 2024.
“The new payment platform is fully integrated with Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho’s Guidewire core systems and mobile app, enabling policyholders to access their information and make transactions when and where they want.”
VALUE DELIVERED
The successful project has not only reduced operating costs associated with the payments process by 75%, but it has also yielded a modernized digital payment process for customers across all lines of business. For instance, the company can now leverage automation for applying payments and managing reversals, creating a more streamlined process for customers, agents, and employees.
Customers and agents are also seeing a better, more consistent user experience. The new payment platform is fully integrated with Farm Bureau Insurance Company of Idaho’s Guidewire core systems and mobile app, enabling policyholders to access their information and make transactions when and where they want, including the ability to schedule future-dated payments.
For agents, the updated client console exhibits payments in a central dashboard, allowing agents to view both past and upcoming payments in one place. The platform has also laid the groundwork for the insurer to handle other payment methods and digital wallets such as Apple Pay, PayPal, or Google Wallet.