Tornado puts data warehouse to the test

It's been nearly two years since a tornado stormed through Selsey, UK, just before midnight, damaging more than 1,000 buildings. Although only lasting a few seconds, the trail of destruction left behind includes damaged roof slates, knocked down chimneys, broken windows, and demolished sheds and garages.

In the aftermath of the tornado, UK-based GAN Insurance was able to assess the extent of possible insurance claims in minutes using data warehouse software. Without the data warehouse this process would have taken a days.

By entering the Selsey area postal code into the SASdata warehouse interface, GAN was able to extract relevant policy details of all 53 customers living in the affected area. This allowed GAN to contact all customers to ensure whether they have been affected by the storms and their property damaged and to prepare for the influx of claims.

Since the storm, the insurer has been expanding the scope of the data warehouse project. Mark Shepherd, data warehousing project manager at GAN Insurance said: "We are developing a SAS Data Warehouse for all classes of business. After the Selsey Tornado, we were able to put the system to the test."

Rather than trying to tackle all areas of the business at once, GAN is taking a phased approach.