The Philadelphia Contributionship

Success Story
The Philadelphia
Contributionship
Success Story
Robert Whitlock, President and CEO,
The Philadelphia Contributionship
About The Philadelphia
Contributionship
The Philadelphia Contributionship
(TPC) was founded by Benjamin
Franklin and his fellow firefighters
to provide fire insurance to
homeowners in Philadelphia and
the surrounding region.
The company issued its first policies
in 1752. Now, with an A.M. Best
rating of “A” or higher for the past
93 years and $123 million in net
written premium, TPC is a MidAtlantic provider of homeowners, fire
and liability insurance to customers
in Pennsylvania, New Jersey,
Delaware and Maryland through
TPC and its subsidiary companies,
including Germantown Insurance,
The Philadelphia Contributionship
Insurance Co. and Franklin Agency.
Results & Benefits
• Entered a new state and started
writing new business in nine months
• On time, on budget implementation
• Faster, more intuitive quoting
• Enabled better agent
communication
• Improved ease-of-doing business
for agents
• Reduced agent keystrokes
The Philadelphia
Contributionship
Expands Business with
SurePower Innovation
®
The Philadelphia Contributionship (TPC) respects and has pride in its history,
dating back to 1752. However, in 2013 the oldest property and casualty
(P&C) insurer in the United States took new steps to focus more on the
future. While the lights were staying on, business was operating and agents
were satisfied, the future wouldn’t be kind if the company continued to rely
on the existing 30-year-old homegrown legacy system.
The talent to maintain this technology and platform was difficult to find, and
the time required to enter new markets was long and painful. Also of great
concern to TPC was the future of the front-facing agent system that sat on
top of the legacy system.
“The 1980s type of technology was no longer viable for the long run,”
says Robert Whitlock, President and CEO of TPC. “Agents were satisfied.
However, it was built on a house of cards, and there was a storm brewing.”
The goals were lofty, and after two failed attempts at implementing a new
system, with some angst and anxiety TPC set out again on the modern
technology quest that led to SurePower Innovation.
“SurePower Innovation had everything we were looking for
in an end-to-end suite, including reinsurance. That was
very important to us.”
Erin Jozwiak, Business Intelligence Manager, Underwriting
Choosing an end-to-end suite wasn’t what TPC
had originally planned to do during the early
stages of the search for a new solution. “We went
into this thinking best-of-breed was the way to go
after terminating a previous implementation with
a suite provider,” Whitlock says. “We felt like we
could implement more carefully. The more we got
into it, the more advice we got that it was not the
way to go because the integrations are harder.”
TPC set the tone early, involving 30% of the
TPC team in the selection process right from the
beginning. “IT didn’t drive this project,” says Ben
Cartafalsa, IT Project Manager at TPC. “At the
end of the day, IT doesn’t use the software. In
addition to leadership, we brought in key users to
make this project their own.”
During the evaluation process, TPC worked
with an analyst firm, starting with nine software
providers. After requests for information and
proposals, the insurer worked the list down to
three providers and asked each of them
for scripted demos. After the scripted demos,
TPC asked ISCS for a proof-of-concept. TPC
put a number of business units, from the
leadership to the users, in the test system.
“SurePower Innovation had everything we were
looking for in an end-to-end suite, including
reinsurance,” says Erin Jozwiak, Business
Intelligence Manager, Underwriting, at TPC.
“That was very important to us.”
TPC made a site visit to ISCS’s office to meet
the entire team before the final decision. After
the visit, TPC was confident in the decision to
choose SurePower Innovation. “In the scorecard
process, there’s not a single vendor that’s going
to score perfectly across all functional areas,”
says Kevin Tate, CFO at TPC. “So, you try to find
that balance of overall quality of the product and
the culture of the vendor. It was pretty clear cut at
that point that ISCS was the right choice.”
ISCS Success Story: The Philadelphia Contributionship 3
Implementation
Prior to the SurePower Innovation implementation,
TPC wrote business in Delaware, Pennsylvania
and New Jersey. Entering new states was a goal,
so TPC took a greenfield deployment approach,
starting with the state of Maryland.
“The whole process of rolling out the systems
was consistent with our culture,” Whitlock says.
“We have a very well-developed enterprise risk
management culture here. A project like this is
full of risk, and we thought carefully about how
we wanted to roll this out. We were entering a
new state as part of our strategy, and we had the
opportunity to align that strategy with this project.”
The agile methodology was new to TPC. Because
bumps are inevitable along the implementation
road, especially with a new methodology, TPC
took advantage of the availability of ISCS’s
current customers and sought out their input.
And, the true partnership with no-holds-barred
communication between TPC and ISCS kept the
implementation moving.
Cartafalsa also credits the leadership’s
involvement. Whitlock, Tate and VP of IT, Randy
Lennon, attended all of the weekly status
meetings and were hands-on. “Bob’s testing
underwriting; Kevin’s testing reinsurance,”
Cartafalsa says. “In other companies, you
probably wouldn’t see the CEO and CFO rolling
up their sleeves, getting their hands dirty.”
The momentum increased, and TPC started
to realize the benefits of agile. Getting agents
on-board was a high point. Entering a new state
means new relationships with agents. TPC
involved its agent customers very early in the
process, through site visits and access to the
test system.
In the end, Maryland took nine months from first
sprint to live with SurePower Innovation with all of
the increased functionality the system provides.
TPC went live in Maryland on June 2, 2014,
exactly 262 years from issuing the insurer’s first
policy in 1752.
“With SurePower Innovation, we’ve been able to leapfrog some of
the competition. Our reputation has started to move toward more
mainstream and innovative than what we’ve had in the past.”
Robert Whitlock, President and CEO
4 ISCS Success Story: The Philadelphia Contributionship
ISCS Success Story: The Philadelphia Contributionship 5
TPC next went live in Delaware in December 2014
and Pennsylvania in July 2015. And, the insurer’s
largest state, New Jersey, will be next.
“The whole roll-out strategy was to manage the
risk, small to large,” Whitlock says. “I’ve been in
projects where it’s been the other way – where
the attitude was ‘We need payback right away.
Let’s go to our biggest state and get the payback.’
While that can work, it certainly adds risk.”
The Payback
“We haven’t taken a standard return-oninvestment approach,” Whitlock says. “The longterm returns are going to be evident. We manage
the finances based on staying in our budget.”
TPC is realizing many benefits on a larger
scale, outside of the bottom line. “This changed
our reputation as a company in terms of our
technological capabilities,” Whitlock says.
“With SurePower Innovation, we’ve been able to
leapfrog some of the competition. Our reputation
has started to move toward more mainstream
and innovative than what we’ve had in the past.”
And, that’s impressing agents. “Agents really like
the functionalities and features, including Copy
Quote,” says Caitlin Watts, Marketing and Brand
Manager. “Instead of rekeying multiple iterations
for different premium thresholds, it’s just a simple
button. They also like the Request Review and
instantaneous access to the document center.”
SurePower Innovation is also impressing TPC
users. “One feature that’s really gaining popularity
is statement bill,” Whitlock says. “We write a lot
of property investors on our policies. Some of
our customers have multiple policies, and we’re
able to treat them as individuals. It’s going to be a
popular feature in our big states.”
TPC appreciates SurePower Innovation’s overall
advanced architecture built on one web-based
platform and the benefits it provides. “We
currently have two of our three carriers on
this system,” Cartafalsa says. “Before SurePower
Innovation, if you wanted to look at a policy in
“It’s nice to be able to work in one platform rather than having one
web-based platform and a separate internal platform and having
to deal with two development efforts – one for agents and one for
internal users. Now, it’s all one-in-the-same.”
Lewis Agosta, IT Development Manager
6 ISCS Success Story: The Philadelphia Contributionship
“SurePower Innovation will evolve with the users and the product.
That’s one of the things we like about ISCS. They’re always
refreshing the system to keep it up to date and ready for the future.”
Ben Cartafalsa, IT Project Manager
one of the carrier accounts you would have to log
into that system. If you wanted to look at another,
you’d have to log into that one. With SurePower
Innovation, it’s just one system, one login.”
It’s intuitive, says Lewis Agosta, IT Development
Manager at TPC. “It was amazing how quickly
you could jump on there and quote right away,”
he says. “It’s nice to be able to work in one
platform rather than having one web-based
platform and a separate internal platform and
having to deal with two development efforts – one
for agents and one for internal users. Now, it’s all
one-in-the-same.”
And, TPC has confidence in ISCS’s and
SurePower Innovation’s ability to adapt. “ISCS
evolves,” Cartafalsa says. “SurePower Innovation
will evolve with the users and the product. That’s
one of the things we like about ISCS. They’re
always refreshing the system to keep it up to date
and ready for the future.”
Front row, left to right: Erin Jozwiak, Business Intelligence Manager,
Underwriting; Kevin Tate, CFO; Robert Whitlock, President and CEO;
Ben Cartafalsa, IT Project Manager
Middle row, left to right: Steve McGowan, AVP & Controller;
Lewis Agosta, IT Development Manager; Caitlin Watts, Marketing
and Brand Manager
Back row, left to right: Steve Oleck, Quality Assurance Manager;
Randy Lennon, VP of IT; Brian Junod, Product Manager
ISCS Success Story: The Philadelphia Contributionship 7
The Philadelphia Contributionship
Success Story
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ISCS is the developer of SurePower Innovation®, a highly scalable, configurable, cloud-based modern enterprise suite that mitigates risk and
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