3 Best Practices All Insurance Agencies Should Follow

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Insurance agencies are charged with the important task of making sure their clients’ lives and worldly possessions are covered. From life, car, to home insurance, small insurance agencies throughout Massachusetts often have a lot to juggle and using technology is just one aspect of the business.

One such technology is the software that an insurance agency uses to manage their client information. A popular software tool used by many agencies in the Greater Boston area is a product named Special Agent, from Special Agent Inc. However, improper management of great tools like this could be disastrous from an IT infrastructure standpoint. So here are a few best practices insurance agents should follow in order to avoid catastrophes of their own:

3 IT Best Practices for Small Insurance Agency Offices:

1) Host data on a file server — NOT on a personal workstation. One of our clients recently came to us because they installed the special agent software on someone’s personal workstation within their office, so all the agents were able to use it. But because this was on a personal machine connected to the internet and not on a dedicated file server, the individual’s machine got infected with a computer virus which impacted the “special agent” software resulting in the loss of several weeks worth of client information.

Individual PCs are not designed to behave as storage devices — so treating them as file servers not only exposes them to viruses, but doing so will also significantly slow machine performance as well. So invest in a file server to ensure that client information is protected regardless of individual workstation computer infections.

2) Backup all data. Speaking of losing data, make sure to backup all agency data on a regular basis, regardless of where it is hosted. There are maintenance options that can be part of your IT routine — you can opt for manual backups or automatically send backed-up data to a secured location on a regularly scheduled, recurring time.

The cost of lost data is very high. The cost of backing up data regularly can be very minimal. Backing up data is well worth the investment. Doing so can help your business easily recover lost data should an infected program make its way to your most important files.

3) Find a local IT company that understands your needs. Lastly, if you are small office has been “making do” in the last few months (or even years!) without the help of an IT guru, it may be time to make the jump to an IT professional services company. If you do have an IT firm, it’s good to have a review of their services.

For example, another insurance agency client came to us because they were overpaying for their IT services and not getting the support that they needed. Their previous IT company was a large firm and didn’t specialize in working with smaller insurance agencies. This vendor had a standard offering that did not fit this particular company’s requirements. As a result, there were gaps in the IT infrastructure that caused a loss of critical data loss for the firm and at a very high cost.

The Bottom Line:

You are insurance experts, not IT experts. Running your business gives you enough to worry about: don’t add a loss of data or IT management to your long list of things to do. Making sure you have a dedicated file server that’s backed up on a regular basis is your best chance for success. And, double check that the IT services that you are getting are in fact what your company requires.

KyndL has years of experience putting the right IT systems in place in the most cost-effective and efficient way possible. If you work in an insurance agency with offices in Massachusetts, and would like to get an evaluation on your existing IT support, or are in need of an experienced and reliable IT firm to set up, monitor, backup, and provide support to your systems, don’t hesitate to contact us today.