Blue Cross knowledge-enables sales agents, customers

As part of its plan to simplify the interaction between its agents and customers, Blue Cross/Blue Shield of Minnesota (Blue Cross) is implementing a new system to familiarize its sales force with each product and offer the right package to customers.

Blue Cross offers insurance plans with many variations for healthcare and other employee benefits. Using FirePond's Signature Plus system connected to legacy systems, agents can obtain information about regulatory procedures, rate tables, pricing options, participating medical professionals, and available medical facilities. They can also obtain status of customer accounts -- tracking processes, like underwriting, from start to finish.

Armed with this info, agents can then sit down with a client, input specific customer information and instantly recommend a customized plan with a preliminary quote. They can also create if/then scenarios with customers to illustrate and compare complex plan options.

From this interaction customers receive a personalized proposal booklet with information about the nearest clinic, its departments and doctors.

Aside from reducing customers' fears about selecting the best health plan, Blue Cross expects to develop a more knowledgeable sales force, which will lead to happier and more loyal customers.

"In the initial planning stages, we've already had a overwhelmingly positive response from our agents," says Richard Neuner, Blue Cross' chief sales and marketing officer. With real-time access to information and personalization to each client's specific health care needs, "they see Blue Cross as the plan of choice for their clients."

Firepond and partner Ernst & Young LLP, will implement the system in phases beginning in Q1 '99