How VGA built a multifunctional claims portal

Dutch Insurer VGA Provides Customers with Unified Claims Portal and 24/7 Insight Into Claim Status Via Low-Code-Built Solution

Portal built by Bizzomate on Mendix platform improves customer satisfaction by making claims process transparent and streamlines operations by consolidating multiple processes into one application

Mendix, a Siemens business and the global leader in enterprise low-code, today announced that VGA, the Dutch insurance company owned by the municipality of Amsterdam, has leveraged the Mendix low-code platform to create ‘VGA Schadeportaal,’ a digital portal for damage claims. The portal enables VGA to work closely with its customers in one environment where claims are both reported and processed. The new solution not only enabled VGA to speed up the process and improve efficiency, but also provides customers with 24/7 insight into the status of their claim. And thanks to the flexibility of Mendix low-code technology, VGA can easily add new functionality based on the needs of its customers, essentially creating a future-proof solution.

The primary task of VGA is to provide insurance to the municipality of Amsterdam and companies and institutions associated with it, such as the water and port authority and the municipal transport company. VGA also offers collective insurance to municipal officials and their families. And VGA acts as a broker, for example, for construction insurance.

The need for a new damage registration system at VGA was driven by the increasing demands of its customers. “In the event of damage, good and fast communication during the claims handling process is essential,” explains Egon Jacobs, director at VGA and responsible for the claims department. “Our previous system only let customers register damages. However, they wanted to be in charge of the damage process and have more insight into the status of the claim.

Low-code offers flexible and cost-efficient environment
VGA first looked at standard applications, but quickly discovered that integration between these applications and the base system was a bottleneck. And like any insurer, VGA must meet the requirements of the supervising authority, so compliance plays an important role. “The consultancy firm that guided us in the process pointed us to the possibility of developing a solution ourselves using a low-code platform. We never even heard of low-code, but soon learned that it could offer us an extremely flexible and cost-efficient environment,” Jacobs says.

Low-code is a visual development approach that enables developers of varied experience levels to quickly create applications for web and mobile, using drag-and-drop components and model-driven logic.

“We ultimately choose to work with Mendix partner Bizzomate,” Jacobs states. “They clearly demonstrated that they have a great deal of knowledge and experience in the insurance industry, and were able to provide us with tailored advice. We felt the Mendix technology would cater to our needs best in terms of flexibility and facilitating collaboration between the developers and our product owner. We learned that Mendix is also the go-to low-code platform for the municipality of Amsterdam. Hearing their experiences was an extra validation of our decision.”

Bizzomate leveraged a range of Mendix capabilities in developing the VGA solution, among them sophisticated collaborative functionality; the availability of numerous pre-built widgets; and a process that is tremendously faster than traditional methodologies.

According to Sjonny Calis, claims handler at VGA and product owner of the portal, “Thanks to the Mendix platform, we have an extremely flexible solution we can use to continuously optimize our processes and communication with our customers.”

Management information about efficiency in claims process

VGA and its customers now work together in one unified portal. The customer logs in to the portal and sees everything that is happening with their claim, including all e-mail correspondence.

“Our requirements were extensive, but Mendix and Bizzomate were able to deliver what VGA and our customers needed,” says Jacobs. “VGA Schadeportaal makes the process of reporting damage and handling claims consistent and provides us with management information, for example, about our own efficiency in the claims process and the possibility to effectively manage workloads. This was something we didn’t have before. But, and this is even more important, we now can provide more valuable information to our customers 24/7 as well.”

“This is a giant leap from where we were and helps us tremendously in optimizing customer satisfaction. The new portal, based on low-code technology, has made us future-proof and provides us with the ability to further streamline the process of reporting damage and handling claims,” concludes Jacobs.

Marc Gelissen, founder at Bizzomate, says: “With the VGA Schadeportaal, the organization is at the forefront of innovation in the insurance industry. It took some guts to take on this project as a relatively small organization, but in the end it has proven very fruitful, and serves as an example for other insurance companies looking to improve their process of reporting damage and handling claims.”

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