Launching a new program
A binder is signed and the business expects to be writing inside a quarter. What follows is rating to configure, forms to produce, a portal for the producers, a bordereau the carrier will accept, and a reconciliation nobody has designed yet. Most of that work is the same work as last time.
The symptoms
- A new program takes quarters to launch.
- Every program gets its own spreadsheet.
- The carrier's template arrives after you have built one.
What a good answer looks like
None of this needs us in the room. Run it this way with the people you already have and the problem gets smaller.
01 · Start from the binder, not the system
The binder already fixes the appetite, the limits, the delegated authority and what the carrier is owed. Encode those first and most of the configuration stops being a decision. The programs that run late are the ones where the authority limits were still being argued in month two.
02 · Separate what varies from what never does
Rating, forms, appetite and the bordereau template vary per program. Identity, roles, approval gates, the audit trail and the way money is reconciled do not. Build the second set once, for every program, or you will rebuild it for each.
03 · Design the reporting before the first policy
The bordereau is the thing the carrier judges you on, and it is usually the last thing anyone specifies. Agree its structure while the binder is fresh, and generate it from the policy data from day one rather than assembling it later.
04 · Give it a launch number, not a launch date
A date tells you whether the project slipped. A number, such as the weeks from binder to first bound policy, tells you whether the second program will be cheaper than the first. Track it across programs and the answer becomes visible.
What makes it hard once you are at scale
A program launch is not one project, it is several running against the same team. The carrier changes the template mid-build. Delegated authority differs by state or territory, so a single rule set will not hold. Producers will not adopt a portal that asks them for data they already sent. And the program that is late is rarely the one with the hardest rating: it is the one where nobody owned the reconciliation until the first month closed.
Where it sits in the blueprint
Program launch is the case where the connecting layer pays off most visibly. The map carries what a program, a binder and an appetite are, so a new one is a composition rather than a rebuild. The gateway carries the identity, the authority limits and the audit trail unchanged. Only the core row changes.
What we bring already built
These are in production. Take them as they are, shape them around how you work, or leave them out and we will integrate what you already run.
- Policy Administration System
- Quote, bind, issue, endorse, renew and cancel, configured per program rather than rebuilt per program.
- Rating Engine
- Configurable product rating, so a new program is a rate set rather than a release.
- Eligibility and Appetite
- The binder's appetite and eligibility rules, encoded and validated at the point of entry.
- Reinsurance and Bordereaux
- Bordereau generation and ceded premium tracking, structured per carrier from the start.
- Broker and agent portal
- The producer surface, standing on the same data as the underwriting workspace.
The number this has to move
One business number, agreed before the work starts, with the baseline taken from your own reporting.
- __ weeks
- Time to launch a new program
Is this the one costing you the most?
We start from what you already run.