Polaris has always promoted the benefits of standards as a means to efficiency and cost savings within the insurance industry. Where relevant it has provided the industry with software that assists in the common implementation of the standards.
Prior to merging with Polaris, the Commercial Lines Market Initiative (CLMI) had the responsibility for developing standards for commercial lines insurance and this task was absorbed into the wider remit of the new company. CLMI had developed an overall data model covering personal, commercial and re-insurance requirements in the UK general market place. In addition the process flows were documented and re-assessed for support of electronic processing with the necessary standards and EDI messages being developed.
For UK personal lines business
(motor and household) Polaris worked closely with the InStep section within the Association of
British Insurers (ABI) to develop the personal lines processing model
especially with respect to Point Of Sale (POS) processing. The pre-existing EDI messages (UKTDI)
continues as the basis for
insurer/intermediary interchanges.
As newer technologies are
developed to support electronic trading, such as the internet and WAP, Polaris
reviews these and modifies both the standards and/or the software support
provided to cater for these.The integration of InStep into Polaris has brought
together the responsibility for developing and maintaining the insurance
standards and their supporting code lists for personal lines and
commercial business.
In addition, the recent addition of the anti-fraud initiatives to Polaris’ responsibilities is enables the various databases in use or under development to be integrated into a common standard.
Polaris develop and maintain standards in the
following areas:
Business Models - The recent huge increase in the acceptance and
use of internetInternet technology has
offered many new opportunities for trading.
The Polaris software is ideally suited to internetInternet trading and
various business models have been identified, both business to business and
business to consumer.
Process Models - Polaris has have developed , in conjunction with the
ABI, a number of models for processing personal linesthe key
insurance transactions: New Business, Mid Term Adjustments, Renewals and
Cancellations. These
models have enabled insurers and integrators to work together to enhance the
existing insurance systems.
Polaris has also recently produced a business process model to support commercial lines processing which is available on this site.
Data Specifications - the Polaris dictionaries have become the industry standard for the definition of data items required for personal and UK general commercial lines insurance. In addition, involvement with the maintenance of industry code lists has promoted a consistent approach to their use. Polaris data dictionaries are available for UK Private Motor, UK Household, Irish Private Motor, Motorcycle and Commercial business classes.
EDI Messages - UKTDI messages are the accepted standard for
transmitting personal lines risk data between intermediaries and insurers. No messages existed for commercial business so a
new EDIFACT message (IPPOAD) was developed by CLMI and subsequently adopted by
the UN EDIFACT Board. Polaris
use a third party EDI gateway product from Perwill Kewill to provide
translations from the dictionary data to the standard EDI message formats.
XML - the extensive use of the internetInternet has resulted in
the need for a more flexible language than HTML to support the breadth of
e-commerce requirements. XML is has being been developed by the
World Wide Web Consortium (W3C) to meet this need. For the true benefits of XML and e-commerce to accrue the
insurance industry needs to use a common standard and , preferably globally.Polaris is working with
various insurance organisations to developcreate industry standard XML
messages, primarily
for commercial lines trading via the imarket portal.. To assist in this Polaris
have worked with other insurance standard bodies such as ACORD in the USA to
draft initial standards which, via the ABI and EEG7 in Europe, will be
discussed and extended to develop industry standard XML definitions.
(XML
standards) hyperlink
Updated 8279 AugustJulyMarch
20064As the W3C
overall standards for XML and its usage develop these will be kept under review
and the Polaris standards amended/extended as appropriate.