CLIENT OVERVIEW

Founded in 1913, NJM is a leading provider of property and casualty insurance in the Mid-Atlantic region. Though NJM began as a workers’ compensation insurance company, their reputation for outstanding services and commitment to meeting their customers’ needs led to rapid growth and successful expansion into multiple lines of business across different states. NJM currently offers auto, homeowners, renters, condo, and umbrella insurance to individuals, and workers’ compensation, commercial auto, and commercial general liability insurance to businesses. NJM is headquartered in West Trenton, New Jersey and employs approximately 2,500 employees.

BUSINESS CHALLENGE

With the goal of addressing the coverage needs of new and existing customers, NJM decided to expand their commercial offerings to include Business Owners Policy (BOP) and Commercial Umbrella insurance (CUMB) in line with their strategic goal to become a full-service, multi-line regional carrier.

NJM decided to expand upon the existing Guidewire platform for BOP/CUMB policy administration and Quadient Inspire for the CCM platform to develop industry standard and custom carrier-specific forms.

To roll out these new lines of business, NJM decided to expand upon the existing Guidewire platform for BOP/CUMB policy administration and Quadient Inspire for the CCM platform to develop industry standard and custom carrier-specific forms. The end-to-end initiative included creating BOP and CUMB on the Guidewire InsuranceSuite (Policy, Billing, Claims) as well as integrating back office solutions such as documents and financial systems to support the administration of the products. The vast scale and inherent complexity of the program prompted NJM to seek an IT services partner who not only excelled at the technical implementation, but would also offer specific expertise in building and rolling out commercial insurance products.

SOLUTION OFFERED

NJM conducted an RFP process to identify an IT services vendor to support their implementation. Having already worked with ValueMomentum on Quality Assurance and Business Analysis on prior engagements, NJM invited ValueMomentum to participate in the RFP process. After learning about VM’s deep insurance domain knowledge, NJM selected ValueMomentum to be the trusted partner for the implementation of BOP and CUMB. Jozsef Szoke, AVP at NJM, further explains, “ValueMomentum was primarily selected because of their strong understanding of the commercial insurance business, their demonstrated ability to transform a high-level business vision into lower-level business requirements, and their capacity to implement those requirements.”

NJM program managed the implementation and collaborated closely with VM on both PolicyCenter and Documents implementations across three phases (Discovery, Inception, Development) and 6 development sprints.

During the initial stage, NJM worked closely with the business to define requirements and shape the vision for BOP and CUMB offerings. Based on the requirements, NJM then put together an implementation plan. As per the plan, NJM created a product launch questionnaire and underwriting For more information, visit www.valuemomentum.com risk questionnaire, as well as completed product rating algorithm walkthroughs and third-party vendor data analysis. Leveraging VM’s knowledge of Verisk’s ISO Electronic Rating Content (ERC), NJM formulated a framework for measuring deviations from standard insurance loss costs, rules, and forms. This approach helped the company design a product offering that would not only address current market needs, but also be simple to maintain. Ultimately, NJM was able to efficiently implement the new lines in PolicyCenter, establish Predictive Modeling for BOP, and create agent-facing digital experience. Furthermore, NJM rolled out a Producer Distribution Management System (PDMS) to manage producer/ agency onboarding and incentive management.

For Documents, NJM implemented a series of forms, reusable standards, and development practices on the Inspire platform. NJM also drew from ValueMomentum’s technical and insurance-specific expertise to develop reusable assets that would accelerate development. Additionally, a data transformation layer was developed to integrate data from Guidewire PolicyCenter.

VALUE DELIVERED

Working as one team, NJM and ValueMomentum executed the project over 13 months, successfully setting the groundwork and meeting the timelines for NJM to roll out BOP and CUMB lines.

“This has been a very successful partnership from which both parties have benefited,” Szoke elaborates. “NJM has gained from ValueMomentum’s knowledge in commercial lines, while ValueMomentum has benefited from NJM’s decision to entrust ValueMomentum with a major strategic initiative—a first for NJM, as we’ve never relied on a single partner for the implementation of new lines of business in PolicyCenter.”

NEXT STEPS

Over the coming months, NJM will go live with BOP and CUMB and will roll out the new lines of business to the 6 states in which the company operates. Additionally, NJM will begin to leverage a new distribution channel – independent agencies – to offer the competitive and comprehensive products that their customers demand and expect.

By leveraging ValueMomentum’s commercial insurance and technical expertise to implement the new BOP and CUMB lines, NJM has made significant progress in becoming a regional, full-service and multi-line carrier capable of catering to the needs of both new and existing customers.