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October 29, 2012 Bus 473
MANZANA INSURANCE:The Fruitvale Branch
Contents
Executive SummaryThe Fruitvale branch of Manzana Insurance is facing considerable problems. Compared to its
competitors, the Fruitvale branch has been underperforming in most aspects of its operations.
While on the surface appears to be working efficiently, it is actually experiencing significantly
high renewal loss rates, high turnaround times (TAT), and steadily decreasing revenues from its
branches.
Our analysis points to two major problems with the branches’ operations. First, departments use an
altered version of the company’s First In, First Out (FIFO) system based on what they deem to be a
greater priority. This is creating a backlog of the requests that are considered the least profitable,
the RERUNs. The backlog of RERUNs is causing the late renewals and the high renewal loss rate.
Since our analysis shows that each department has enough resource capacity to sufficiently
manage the workload, we recommend that the Fruitvale branch enforce a pure FIFO system with
no exceptions. This would eliminate any backlog and late renewals as well as decrease the renewal
loss rate by a large margin.
Second, the Fruitvale branch’s underwriting department has divided its region into three territories,
with a different team managing each territory. Demand, and therefore workload, at each territory is
not equal leading to some teams working overcapacity while others undercapacity. To eliminate
this discrepancy, we recommend that the Fruitvale branch merge the work from the different
territories into one queue where each team will process requests from the same line. Our analysis
shows that under this condition, the teams will not reach maximum capacity, which would
eliminate the current and prevent future backlog.
4
Overall, our analysis suggests significant company improvement in terms of decreased turnaround
time, eliminated backlogs, and, even under the worstcase scenario, save millions of dollars
annually from a reduced renewal loss rate.
IntroductionAn analysis of the Fruitvale branch of Manzana Insurance shows that it is currently experiencing
substantial operational inefficiencies. The Fruitvale branch shows below average performance in
most aspects of its operations, compared to its main competitor, Golden Gate. Where Golden Gate
has an estimated renewal loss rate of 15% and average turnaround time of 2 days, Fruitvale has
47% renewal loss rate and average turnaround time of 6 days. Golden Gate has no late renewals
while 44% of Fruitvale renewals are late. These operational inefficiencies have translated into a
US $121 thousand loss in the second quarter of 1991 compared to a $1.2 million gain in the same
quarter of the previous year.
The major concerns are:
High and increasing TAT
Falling renewal rate and late renewals
Declining profitability
Improper work load balances among employees
Organization Structure and ProcessesThe Fruitvale branch is one of the smaller branches which only focus on property insurance. The
branch consists of three underwriting teams with 76 agents across three geographic locations.
These teams are supported by distribution clerks, raters, policy writers, and other office personnel.
Each underwriting team is in charge of one geographic area.
5
The process of writing a new commercial policy begins when the distribution clerk receives a
Request for Underwriting (RUN) from an agent. The clerks enter the data into the computer and
distribute the RUN to whichever team is in charge of the geographic location that it originated
from. The underwriting team then processes the RUN and passes it to the Rating Department,
which in turn transfers it to the Policy Writing Department. The writing department completes the
policy and distributes it to the customers. See Figure 1 below for basic operations flow.
Figure 1: Process Flow Diagram
The other three tasks that Fruitvale is responsible for are Requests for Renewal (RERUN), Request
for Additional Insurance (RAIN), and Request for Price (RAP) which becomes a RUN if accepted.
All but RAPs follow the same process flow as RUNs. See Exhibit 1 in the Appendix to see the
process flows for each request type.
Resolving the Issue of Late Requests and Loss of RenewalsThe Fruitvale branch is supposed to handle all operations on a First In, First Out (FIFO) basis;
however, different departments consider some requests of greater importance than others and have
adapted the FIFO system to meet their expectations of what would be the best practice.
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This lack of consistency is one of the causes of the branch’s underperformance. All three of the
underwriting teams work to process RUNs and RAPs on a FIFO basis because they believe them
to be more profitable. Teams only begin work on RAINs and RERUNs, on a separate FIFO basis,
only when all RUNs and RAPs are completed. Further, the last department, Policy Writing, uses
the same prioritization but with the additional consideration of handling the easiest jobs first in
order to eliminate the sheer volume of paper on their desks. This misalignment of tasks, the act of
leaving RERUNs last and forcing the Rating department to give priority to RUNs and RAPs is
creating an increasing backlog of RERUNs.
RERUN requests are automatically generated 30 days before their deadline, the anniversary date of
their policy, and are not released to the distribution clerks until one day before they are due to
ensure the most current information is available. RERUNs compose of 4557% of the total
number of requests in each quarter from 1989 to 1991 and account for 99100% of the total
number of requests that are late, see Exhibit 2. The Fruitvale branch should be concerned about
decreasing their backlog of RERUNs as RERUNs compose a large percentage of the total requests
that they receive and process.
Thus, to minimize the number of late renewals (RERUNs) and to lower the renewal loss rate, our
first recommendation is for the Fruitvale branch to enforce one, pure FIFO system for all types of
requests with no exceptions, so that RERUNs are given equal priority. Since we know that the
Fruitvale branch’s resources are undercapacity, a pure FIFO system would ensure that all requests
are treated equally which would eliminate the RERUNs backlog and lower the renewal loss rate to
a competitive level.
Process Flow Capacity and Queue
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From Figure 2 below, the Fruitvale branch appears to have no bottlenecks in their processes as all
resources are operating undercapacity. Since there are three independent underwriting teams,
however, one team may be operating over or undercapacity while still appearing to be efficient
overall.
The average inventory in this process flow table represents the number of requests in process, but
since each request is processed by one server, it also represents the average number of servers that
are busy at any given time processing requests. At any given time at the Fruitvale branch, 3.55 out
of 4 distribution servers are busy. Similarly, out of 3 underwriting teams, 2.67 are busy; out of 8
Raters, 6.22 are busy; and out of 5 Policy Writers, 5.58 are busy. Thus, all departments appear to
be undercapacity.
Figure 2: Process Flow
Avg. Requests Distributor Underwriting Rating Policy WritingAvg. Inventory 3.5555 2.6667 6.22 4.58Avg. Time flow 0.6667 hour 0.5 hour 1.1667 hour 0.9167 hourThroughput 5.33/hour 5.33/hour 5.33/hour 5/hour
We suspect that underwriting is a primary source of the problem because it is the only process that
uses multiple queues. To verify this, we calculated the size of the input buffer for each department
in the below queue length calculations. The queue represents the average number of customers
waiting for service, in other words, the average inventory of inflow units in the input buffer.
We used the queue length formula to identify the average number of requests waiting to be
processed by each department:
8
C(¿¿ i2+CP
2)
2
Ii=u√2(c+1)
(1−u)∗¿
Where:Ii = Average number of flow units waiting in input bufferu = Capacity utilization, u = Ri/Rp (interarrival time divided by throughput capacity)c = Number of serversCi = Coefficient of variation in interarrival times Cp = Coefficient of variation in process times
Notes: For the standard deviation for process time we used the average of the four different types of jobs in each of the four departments. Ri = 24 hours as agents drop off all requests at the end of the day and in the morning the process starts. Thus we assume that coefficient of variation in interarrival times (Ci) is zero for all steps for the same reason. There is no variation in arrival times if all the requests arrive at the same time in the morning.
Distribution:u = 1.6667/6 = 0.277777Cp = (30.7 + 24.9 + 9.2 + 6.2)/2= 17.752(4+1)¿
1 /2/(1−0.277777)∗(0+17.752
)/2I i=0.27777¿
Ii=3.797
Underwriting:u = 1.6667/6 = 0.277777Cp = (32 + 24.5 +11.7 + 19.8)/2= 222(3+1)¿
1/2/(1−0.277777)∗(0+222
)/2Ii=0.277777¿
Ii=8.95
Rating:u = 1.6667/6.8 = 0.2451Cp = (20.5 + 13.6 + 15.9 + 9.7/2= 14.9252(8+1)¿
1/2/(1−0.2451)∗(0+14.92 52
) /2Ii=0.2451¿
Ii=0.379
9
Policy Writing:u = 1.6667/6 = 0.1761Cp = (32 + 24.5 +11.7 + 19.8)/2= 222(5+1)¿
1/2/(1−0.1761)∗(0+9.46662
)/2Ii=0.1761¿
Ii=1.053
Looking at the number of inventory in each queue, the underwriting department has the largest, at
close to nine requests at any given time. This clearly shows that the underwriting department is the
source of one of the inefficiencies.
The Underwriting DepartmentUsing the 95% SCT values standardized across all Manzana branches to calculate the turnover
time, we have calculated the total time (hours) required by each underwriting team to complete
their requests each day. Since the processing time of all the underwriting teams times are the
same, we assume they work equally as efficient as one another. This means any discrepancy
between total processing times is likely due to differences in workload. In Figure 3 below, we see
that underwriting team 1 (the team that processes the requests from territory 1) has an increasingly
large workload with 17.13 hours/day of work as compared to team 3 which has only 12.78
hours/day of work to process based on the first 6 months of 1991.
Figure 3: Processing Time (Hours per day) by Underwriting Team
Year Team 1 Team 2 Team 31989 15.22 14.48 13.651990 16.45 15.28 12.991991* 17.13 14.68 12.78
*First 6 months of 1991Note: for further information about the calculations see Exhibit 3 in the Appendix
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Since there are 2 members per underwriting team, consisting of 1 underwriter and 1 technical
assistant, each working a 7.5 hour work day, there are 15 hours per day towards processing
requests. Any team that requires more than the 15 hour daily maximum is therefore creating a
backlog in requests not completed equal to the difference. Looking at Figure 3 below, underwriting
team 1 has consistently higher processing time (workload) than the other two teams. The
increasing workload for team 1 and decreasing workload for team 3 illustrates that a backlog is
being created with team 3 experiencing idle time. Therefore, the backlog can be reduced, and
potentially eliminated, by deregionalizing and transferring the workload between teams. De
regionalizing the underwriting department would consist of having all three teams jointly
responsible for processing requests from all three territories in order to maintain a FIFO system.
If we further investigate this by calculating the utilization rate of each underwriting team, as seen
in Figure 4 below, we note that underwriting team 1 consistently has the highest utilization rate.
From 1989 to 1991 (estimated from the first 6 months), team 1 has a steadily increasing utilization
rate from 0.84 to 0.90. Team 2 has a fluctuating utilization rate but remains around 0.82. Team 3
has a steadily decreasing utilization rate from 0.75 to 0.69. If these trends continue over time, the
discrepancy in workload between teams 1 and 3 will continue to grow causing an increasingly
large backlog of requests for team 1. Team 1 may see an increased sense of customer
dissatisfaction for territory 1, because of requests backlogged, while team 3 may be idle at times.
Figure 4: Underwriting Team Utilization
Underwriting team in 1989
Total Processing Time (Requests/hr.)
Utilization
1 1.67 0.842 1.64 0.823 1.50 0.75
Underwriting team in 1990
Total Processing Time (Requests/hr.)
Utilization
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1 1.78 0.892 1.72 0.863 1.43 0.71
Underwriting team in 1991 (first 6 mo.)
Total Processing Time (Requests/hr.)
Utilization
1 1.80 0.902 1.62 0.813 1.38 0.69
By deregionalizing the underwriting department, the workload for each team will be evenly
distributed and turnaround time consistency will be improved. Overall the teams are working
undercapacity and so deregionalizing the department would remove the bottleneck present for
requests received from territory 1.
Factors Affecting PerformanceThree main factors identified are:
1. Prioritizing: Though the company’s policy was to use the FIFO approach at each stage of
the underwriting process, RUNs and RAPs are given more priority over RAINs and
RERUNs, due to the perception that customers will renew their policies anyway at some
point. Moreover the RUNs and RAPs are more profitable for agents as they receive 25%
commission whereas only 7% is given for RERUNs.
2. Underutilization: The capacity calculations show that the variance in each team’s utilization
is large and increasing every year. This is mainly due to increased waiting time and uneven
workloads given to each team resulting in situations where some teams are overworking
while others are idle.
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3. Loss of renewals (RERUNs): According to the data given over the last quarters, the
company had 44 % of renewals processed late and 47 % of renewals lost. Giving the agents
short notice of RERUNs they may recommend clients to other insurance agencies. The
inability of the company to provide timely processing of RERUNs is causing loss of
customer volume, thereby reducing the company’s profitability.
Summary of RecommendationsIn order to resolve the problems described above at the Fruitvale branch, we recommend the
following:
1. Implement a pure FIFO system
2. Deregionalize the Underwriting department
Estimated Improvements to Turnaround Time (TAT)From Figure 1: Process Flow Diagram, all of the departments at the Fruitvale branch are currently
within their working capacity. Using our recommendation to deregionalize the underwriting
department, the underwriting teams will be able to handle their current inflow of requests, without
creating a backlog, and requests may be processed shortly after they are received.
To calculate our estimated TAT, we first determine the expected number of RUNS, RAPs, RAINs,
and RERUNs that could be received on a typical day. The expected number of each type of
request is found by taking its percentage of the total number of requests and multiplying it by 40,
the daily number of requests received. As seen in the appendix Exhibit 4, we would expect to
receive 3 RUNs, 14 RAPs, 4 RAINs, and 19 RERUNs. Using the 95% SCT, the total processing
time for these requests is 11,441.5 minutes which results in a weighted average TAT of 0.64 days,
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as seen in Exhibit 5. Comparing our estimated TAT of 0.64 days to our current TAT of 8.15 days,
calculations shown in Exhibit 6, there is a difference of about 7 working days or more than 1
working week. A TAT of 0.64 days is also highly competitive with Golden Gate’s guaranteed TAT
of one working day. As agents often use the branch’s TAT as one indication of service, having a
low TAT will likely also lead to an increase in the number of new requests received.
Estimated Financial BenefitsBased on our recommendation of operating under a pure FIFO system and deregionalizing the
underwriting department we calculated three different scenarios on how this will affect our bottom
line. We will use the renewal loss rate of our competitor, Golden Gate, as a benchmark on how we
could potentially operate. From Figure 5 below, our scenarios will be a “Best Case”, “Standard
Case”, and “Worst Case”. Since Golden Gate’s renewal loss rate is 15%, in our best case scenario
we estimate that our renewal loss rate could go as low as 10% which would reduce our losses by
78.72%. For our standard scenario we could match the benchmark at 15%, a reduction of our
losses of 68.09% and in our worst case scenario we predict that our renewal loss rate will drop by
half to 25%, a reduction in our losses of 46.81%.
Figure 5: Scenario Analysis
1991 Worst Case (in thousands)
First Half Second Half
Team 1 403.00Team 2 227.00Team 3 296.00
1991 Standard Case (in thousands) First Half Second Half
Team 1 403.00Team 2 227.00Team 3 296.00
Total
* Assuming a constant renewal loss rate based upon the first half of 199114
1991 Best Case (in thousands)
First Half Second Half Recovered* Revenue Recovered on the Second Half
Team 1 403.00 85.74 317.26 $1,104.87Team 2 227.00 48.30 178.70 622.34Team 3 296.00 62.98 233.02 811.51
Total $2,538.72
Using data from the case we calculated the revenue per renewal to be $3.48. Thus by multiplying
the renewal price times the expected recovered renewals, we can calculate recoverable revenues.
From Figure 5, we can see that in the best possible outcome, we would earn revenues from
reducing the renewal loss rate from 47% to 10% of 2.5 million dollars. Even in the worst possible
scenario, we would earn revenues of 1.5 million dollars. This additional revenue in the worst case
scenario assumes that our renewal loss rate is reduced to 25% which is much higher than the
competition at 15%. This implies that it can be achievable with the proper implementation of our
recommendations.
ConclusionBy enforcing a strict FIFO policy with regards to the processing of requests and deregionalizing
the separate underwriting teams of the Fruitvale branch of Manzana Insurance, we expect to see an
improvement in the company’s operations. These improvements include an increase in efficiency
in processing requests, a decrease in the amount of requests backlogged, as well as an increase in
revenues.
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Appendix
Exhibit 1: Process Flow Diagrams for Each Request Type
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Exhibit 1 Continued
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Exhibit 2: RERUNs as Component of Late Requests
Year 1989 1990 1991Quarter 1st Q 2nd Q 3rd Q 4th Q 1st Q 2nd Q 3rd Q 4th Q 1st Q 2nd QRequests Processed
2282 2352 2359 2383 2305 2401 2457 2476 2289 2391
Requests Late 205 192 221 201 227 248 310 387 425 471RERUNs Processed
1288 1283 1287 1308 1268 1253 1228 1238 1018 1063
RERUNs Late 205 191 220 201 225 248 310 387 425 468RERUNs as a Percent of Requests
57% 55% 56% 55% 55% 52% 50% 50% 44% 44%
RERUNs as a Percent of Late Requests
100% 99% 99% 100% 99% 100% 100% 100% 100% 99%
Exhibit 3: Calculations for Processing Times by Underwriting Teams Underwriting Team (95% SCT)
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Request Type Processing Time (min)RUNs 107.2RUNs (prev. RAP)* 0RAPs 87.5RAINs 49.4RERUNs 62.8
*RUNs that are previously RAPs go directly to policy writing
Processing Requests – Territory 1
Year RUNsRUNs(prev. RAP)
Total RUNs
RAPs (Total) RAINs RERUNs
Total Processing
Time (min/year)
Total Processing
Time (Hours/ day)
1989 268 131 399 1000 276 1713 237440.4 15.221990 305 164 469 1232 358 1568 256651.6 16.451991 (6 months) 162 112 274 761 196 636 133577.1 17.13
Processing Requests – Territory 2
Year RUNsRUNs(prev. RAP)
Total RUNs
RAPs (Total) RAINs RERUNs
Total Processing
Time (min/year)
Total Processing
Time (Hours/ day)
1989 186 132 318 815 237 1958 225921.9 14.481990 190 144 334 907 237 2021 238357.1 15.281991 (6 months) 100 79 179 513 125 840 114534.5 14.68
Processing Requests – Territory 3
Year RUNsRUNs(prev. RAP)
Total RUNs
RAPs (Total) RAINs RERUNs
Total Processing
Time (min/year)
Total Processing
Time (Hours/ day)
1989 212 139 351 952 264 1495 212954 13.651990 183 136 319 940 264 1398 202703.6 12.991991 (6 months) 88 83 171 524 130 605 99699.6 12.78
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Exhibit 4: Expected Number of Each Request per Day
1990(3rd
Quarter)
1990(4th
Quarter)
1991(1st
Quarter)
1991(2nd
Quarter)
Total For 1 Year
Percent of Total
Requests
Expected Requests
Received/DayRUNs 178 178 164 186 706 0.07 3RAPs 819 831 862 936 3448 0.36 14RAINs 232 229 245 206 912 0.09 4RERUNs 1228 1238 1018 1063 4547 0.47 19Total 2457 2476 2289 2391 9613 1 40
Exhibit 5: Expected TAT
Operating Steps RUNs RAPs RAINs RERUNs TOTALs1 Distribution Clerks (4 Clerks) 128.1 107.8 68.1 43.22 Underwriting (3 Teams) 107.2 87.5 49.4 62.83 Rating (8 Raters) 112.3 88.7 89.4 92.24 Policy Writing (5 Writers) 89.3 72.1 67Total TAT per Request(no wait at any point)
436.9 284 279 265.2
Number of Requests per Day 3 14 4 19 40TAT (min) 1310.7 3976 1116 5038.8 11441.5Weighted TAT (days) 0.64
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Exhibit 6: Current Backlog and TAT for the Week Ending 6 September 1991
# of Requests to be Processed Total Throughput DaysOperating Steps RUNs RAPs RAINs RERUNs1 Distribution Clerks (4 Clerks)Total at DCs 1 3 1 11To be processed 1 3 1 11Average per DC 0.25 0.75 0.25 2.7595% SCT per request 128.1 107.8 68.1 43.2Total minutes 32.025 80.85 17.025 118.8 0.55
2 Underwriting (3 Teams)Total at DCs 1 3 1 11Total at UTs 3 7 6 36To be processed 4 10 7 47Average per UT 1.33 3.33 2.33 15.6795% SCT per request 107.2 87.5 49.4 62.8Total minutes 142.93 291.67 115.27 983.87 3.41
3 Rating (8 Raters)Total at DCs 1 3 1 11Total at UTs 3 7 6 36Total at RTs 1 2 1 7To be processed 5 12 8 54Average per RT 0.625 1.5 1 6.7595% SCT per request 112.3 88.7 89.4 92.2Total minutes 70.1875 133.05 89.4 622.35 2.03
4 Policy Writing (5 Writers)Total at DCs 1 3 1 11Total at UTs 3 7 6 36Total at RTs 1 2 1 7Total at PWs 0 N/A 1 2To be processed 5 9 56Average per PW 1 1.8 11.295% SCT per request 89.3 72.1 67Total minutes 89.3 129.78 750.4 2.15
SummaryTotal Backlog 82Total TAT 8.15
** Numbers may differ from those in Exhibit 3 due to rounding
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