Deutsche Allgegeinversicherung Case Study

 Deutsche Allgegeinversicherung (DAV) Case Study

                                       TABLE OF CONTENTS

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EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

ISSUE IDENTIFICATION

ENVIRONMENTAL AND ROOT CAUSE ANALYSIS

ALTERNATIVE AND/OR OPTIONS

RECOMMENDATIONS

IMPLEMENTATION

MONITOR AND CONTROL

EXECUTIVE SUMMARY

The continued plan to advance and adopt a new quality improvement initiative have presented Deutsche Allgegeinversicherung an opportunity to remain one of the prominent global leaders in the insurance industry amidst looming competition and increasingly customer demands.

Insurance had increasingly become a competitive and Deutsch Allgemeinversicherung (DAV) is being faced with the task of distinguishing itself from its competitors by the plan to improve our process of documenting customer information in forms both filled by customers, as well as their by representatives.

 As the insurance industry is evolving, DAV's management have to find ways to maintain their dominant position and also improve in the quality of service they are providing however, a strategic decision have been made to focus on fast and effective customer service.

In order to find out what accuracy levels were like throughout DAV, we have selected New Policy Set-up to be used as a pilot measurement project. A

The deployment of relevant method which give improvement and ultimately lasting solution has become challenging.

 Apparently, we have resolved to employ we have come up with the idea to use Statistical Process Control (SPC). This is a statistical technique that is use to decide whether a process is delivering what the customers need. Statistical Process Control is an integral part of Total Quality Management and Six Sigma.

This techniques is usually used in the manufacturing industry. Insurance companies are in the service industry where problem are harder to evaluate due to the human element and defining what to measure is more difficult. SPC is good at measuring processes such as the process of inputting data from the application form and uses a P –Chart. What P-Charts does is to lay out whether documents are free of errors or not, and these are displayed on the graph. One good advantage of this method is that errors can be analyzed  through the involvement of all departments of our organization and in addition to that, information  can be acquired on specific areas of our organization that need help.

Having gone through the in-depth analysis, we came up with the following recommendations while adopting SPC technique.

1. Survey should be carried on customers;
2. Survey should be carried on Employees
3. Employ Six Sigma Expert
4. Structure a balancing work schedule  
5. Improve Employees supervision.

Annette Kluck

Head- Operation Development

June 26th, 2015

ISSUES IDENTIFICATION

The main issue is how to implement newly enhanced/improved customer documentation process that will have minimal or zero error as we have observed that one element of customer service that needed to improve at DAV was the ability to process information and data without errors, and the ability to retrieve information in a timely manner.

Other Issues

1. Stiff Competition in the industry.
2. Difficulty in ascertaining  what quality customer service  is all about
3. Delivering quality to customers posed a very difficult mission for DAV to achieve.
4. Ill- equipped/ under trained Temporary Staffs
5.  Unbalanced Employees work schedule.

ENVIRONMENTAL AND ROOT CAUSE ANALYSIS

DAV is faced with the difficulties as it sought to improve and enhance its customer documentation and information process with minimal room for errors.  

Dav which is one of the global leading insurance companies is confronted by both external and internal threats.

Insurance service products are increasingly becoming easy to replicate, and not only does DAV compete against the other giants of the industry such as Allianz, but in addition, our organization has many smaller insurance companies as competitors.  

Quality is difficult to measure in service industry like insurance due to inconsistencies as a result of human element.

The case that DAV had difficulty in providing customers with consistent, excellent quality as operations were run in many divisions in different locations. The size and diversity of operations made providing constant quality a very difficult task to achieve.

DAV uses temporary staff in addition to its permanent staff to reduce costs due to seasonal changes. This turnover might add to inconsistencies in customer service quality as the temporary employees may not have sufficient data entry preparation and training.

The long hours employee work may be detrimental thus, the very likelihood to make mistakes

And lastly , In addition to the external threat of a stronger competition encroaching on the market share of DAV, the over reliance of our organization on the abilities of its insurance risk managers also brings about the potential threat of being hollowed out if the managers leave.

ALTERNATIVE AND/OR OPTIONS

The first criterion has to address the immediate decision whether DAV should adopt a new quality improvement initiative that is tailored in resolving all issues that has to do with quality customer service.

Alternative 1. The status Quo should remain.

The major pros is that there will be no large monetary investment required to improve the system. Thus, this save them a lot of finances.

The implication of this is that all issues identified remain unresolved or probably magnified to become more cumbersome. The impending danger is near and DAV might lose its customer base and leadership position in the insurance in industry.

Alternative 2:  DAV should adopt a new quality improvement initiative that is tailored in resolving all issues that has to do with quality customer service.