Customer Success: Van Gilder Corporation

Efficiency Solution Proves Advantageous for Van Gilder Corporation

Rough Notes 2010 Marketing Agency of the Year

Like many companies, the business strategies at Van Gilder are focused on gaining efficiency selling their products and becoming more efficient in servicing and maintaining their customer base. "If it doesn't help out those two things, it's going to be a pretty tough sale," Tod Ashby, Vice President of IT, said of developing changes in their business processes. Founded in 1905, Van Gilder has become the largest independent insurance brokerage firm in the Rocky Mountain Region. They operate from six locations with their headquarters in Denver, Colorado. As Vice President of IT, one of Ashby's primary responsibilities since joining the company more than a decade ago was to devise a plan to extinguish their paper problem. "I've been on a document management kick for almost 10 years," Ashby explained.

As the person responsible for managing the agency's technology advancements, Ashby knew that document management was the solution needed. "In a nutshell, it's just a matter of efficiency," Ashby said. The sheer volume of paper moving through their offices on a daily basis was an immediate indication of their need for a document management solution. A panel of five or six users, IT professionals, and training managers looked at several solutions. To make a decision, the committee focused on features, functionality, and integration. They unanimously decided to invest in PaperWise.

Quick Retrieval

Filing, search, and retrieval were some of the highest priority features for Van Gilder. PaperWise solved the issues that were slowing down their processes. Users can now find any file immediately. Previously, old documents were archived into five storage units that required courier costs for retrieval, not to mention the cabinets that consumed their floor space. Using PaperWise, one person scans and indexes documents. The Denver office alone scans around 2,500 sheets a day. Employees at Van Gilder have all been impressed by the changes their PaperWise system has delivered. "It allows our employees to stay at their desks and do work - often by answering a customer inquiry in one phone call," Ashby says. "Now everything we need is in one spot which really boils down to the ability to get information efficiently."

Many of the tasks performed by Van Gilder associates involve creating new accounts or answering customer inquiries. PaperWise provides such a complete solution to these two major processes that the value of the system is immeasurable for Van Gilder. Although actual misfiling issues were minimal, simply too much time was spent looking for every document needed when helping clients. This resulted in customer service inefficiencies. Today, service has been simplified through database searches that retrieve information instantaneously.

Fast Training

In addition to increased efficiency, Ashby was pleased with how minimal the learning curve was. Some people had reservations about adopting the new system. By the end of training and a short time using the solution, everyone agrees they could never operate without it. "Not only do they rely on it, but they like it," Ashby said.

Reliable Backup Plan

Although Van Gilder has not experienced any problems with disaster recovery since deploying in February 2005, members of the IT department have confidence in how PaperWise protects their data. Their company goal to function with "Seamless Office Operations" is further supported by a reliable back-up plan. "We wanted to ensure that any customer would be able to call any Van Gilder office and get answers no matter what happens," said Ashby. "PaperWise meets other IT objectives like business continuity so if there is a fire or flood, we are able to recover quickly."

Seamless Integration

Van Gilder uses Sagitta, a Vertafore agency management system. PaperWise engineers quickly integrated the two systems, allowing them to exchange information and eliminating any need for dual data entry. Ashby was especially impressed with the process because it was the first integration with this particular product. "The way the integration was done makes PaperWise a natural extension of our management system," Ashby explained.

Further Functionality

PaperWise makes it possible for employees to work from home if needed. With all files available through a simple Internet connection, location does not impact how much work can be accomplished. In addition, the PaperWise team built a set of custom audit tools. These tools help track activity and ensure that procedures are followed. In the future, Ashby hopes to begin using PaperWise features such as Dashboards and Workbench regularly. "Our goal is to start easing into some of these features and see how they can help us," he said. While today they utilize back-end scanning, the agency plans to transition to front-end scanning.

A Brighter Future

In the future, Van Gilder hopes to expand their use of PaperWise to more users, departments, and locations. "Right now, we're working on getting the non-front-office people to use PaperWise," Ashby shared. When it comes to a competitive advantage, Ashby feels having PaperWise definitely gives them an edge in their industry.