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PENSIONCHECK

Home PENSIONCHECK
Overview
Expert System
Features & Benefits
Architecture
Implementation
Testimonials & Licensing
Overview

PensionCheck is a custom solution designed to radically improve pension processing and administration.

PensionCheck addresses two of the most critical problems in pension processing:

  • ensuring proper vesting and eligibility status, and
  • accurately calculating benefit amounts.

PensionCheck identifies and corrects common pension processing errors, reducing administrative time and cost.

BROCHURE PDF
Expert System

Meeting Your Exact Requirements.

PensionCheck utilizes an expert system approach to translate complicated legal plan provisions, government regulations, and local policies and procedures into consistent processing rules for vesting, eligibility, and benefit determinations. These rules are then embedded into an inference engine, which provides real-time processing of complex decision logic.

We tailor the PensionCheck solution to your unique requirements by

  • thoroughly analyzing your legal and summary Pension Plan documents,
  • observing your current operational flow, and
  • interacting directly with your subject matter experts to confirm our understanding of your processing environment.

We then develop and test the PensionCheck inference engine using real data, and implement the engine using interfaces and integrations consistent with your current technology infrastructure.

The end result of this disciplined approach is an accurate, reliable, and invaluable tool for Pension Administrators and their staffs.

Features & Benefits

Features

  • Uses an expert system approach to develop a logical, complete, and accurate set of pension processing rules
  • Supports custom policies and procedures in addition to legal plan requirements
  • Uses business process checklists to ensure that all data and documentation required for a valid benefit award are on file
  • Provides tailored user messages to explain how rules are applied and benefit amounts are calculated
  • Can be used to estimate future pension benefits as well as calculating actual awards
  • Supports various award options including disability, J&S, Age & Service, and others
  • Supports retroactive awards, benefit recalculations, and QDRO (Qualified Domestic Relations Orders) calculations
  • Maintains a detailed, auditable history of every calculation request and all of the data involved in the calculation
  • Uses industry-standard interfaces for integration with legacy databases, current pension-related applications, automated correspondence, and Web-based applications
  • Can be executed in both real-time and batch modes
  • Provides for a more efficient allocation of plan office personnel

Benefits

  • Enforces totally consistent rules for determining vesting, eligibility, and benefit amounts
  • Permanently captures an organization’s unique institutional knowledge and ensures continuity when key personnel leave
  • Eliminates errors based on interpreting plan provisions; shifts the emphasis to accurate input data
  • Reduces or eliminates the need for case-by-case supervisory reviews
  • Eliminates typical auditing errors
  • Minimizes legal challenges
  • Preserves fund assets by eliminating overpayments
  • Enables plan administrators to reallocate personnel to more productive tasks including direct customer servicing
Architecture

Architecture:

The heart of the PensionCheck solution is the Inference Engine. It contains all of the custom decision logic required for analyzing critical pension data elements and correctly determining vesting status, eligibility, and benefit amounts. It also creates a permanent, detailed audit trail by storing all of the input and output data associated with each request to the engine. These audit records can be maintained online, purged, or archived offline depending on your particular requirements.

Implementation

Implementation:

Analyze Pension Plan Requirements

Each PensionCheck project begins with a thorough examination of the legal and summary Pension Plan documents. Extensive interviews are then conducted with your subject matter experts, pension supervisors, IT Director, and other key staff. This confirms our understanding of the plan’s legal provisions as well as the informal policies and procedures which are unique to your organization. We also observe your pension operations to identify the typical kinds of problems encountered in day-to-day processing. Finally, we consult with the IT staff to develop a preliminary strategy for integrating PensionCheck with the existing database and application environments.

Document Decision Logic and Required Data Elements

We document our analysis of the pension plan rules and policies by constructing a comprehensive series of decision-logic paths (DLP’s). Each DLP is a set of English language “if-this, do-that” statements which can be understood by any layperson with a good understanding of the pension plan provisions. We review these DLP’s with plan experts to confirm that we have captured all of the relevant rules. We then identify and confirm all of the critical data elements required to enforce the processing checklist and accurately determine vesting status, eligibility, and benefit amounts.

Develop Operational Recommendations

Based on our observations of your current operating environment, the project team may suggest modifications to your existing business processes to take full advantage of PensionCheck benefits and features. The project team will discuss these with you and make any final adjustments to the software design to accommodate your preferences.

Finalize Integration Strategy

Before starting the actual Inference Engine development, a final integration strategy is established with the IT staff. All required database and external application interfaces are defined, including changes to existing data structures and application processes. Client staff and/or Potomac team members are assigned to develop and test any required modifications.

Design, Develop, and Integrate the Inference Engine

The Inference Engine is developed and tested using live data wherever possible to allow for accurate parallel testing of the new rule structures. Our experience shows that using live parallel data helps in the discovery of “hidden” rules and policies that fail to surface during the analysis phase of the project.

As a final step prior to implementation, we integrate the Inference Engine with related system components to test the complete system architecture before placing it into production mode. These other components may include new applications which are developed during the project in order to provide enhanced system and user capabilities.

Train Users and Technical Staff

User training on the new system is scheduled just prior to system implementation to maximize content retention. Training is conducted by a professional Potomac trainer and can be given in conjunction with client trainers. We will also create the required training materials or we can provide assistance to your training staff with this activity if desired. The project team will also train client technical staff to maintain the production system environment. As an alternative, client technical staff can receive formal training in the CleverPath product directly from Computer Associates.

Implement the System

The final project phase consists of formal system implementation followed by on-site team support for 5 business days. A standard 90-day software warranty is also provided to correct any issues which arise during the warranty period.

Provide Ongoing Support

Potomac offers a standard annual support contract. We can also provide ad-hoc custom modifications on a time-and-materials basis as needed.

Testimonials & Licensing

Testimonials:

  • The very first words that come to mind are: “Total Accuracy.”
  • Our production output has increased significantly because we’ve eliminated the typical errors that cost so much time to track down. Now we focus our energy on making sure the input data is correct – the PensionCheck system takes care of the rest.
  • After we learned to trust the system, we completely eliminated supervisory reviews for the cases handled by our senior analysts.
  • Our month-end adjustments have been reduced to a handful, and we only need those because of last-minute updates to participant work histories.
  • We now allow call center representatives to send pension estimates to members without any review by our pension analysts- that’s how much confidence we have in the PensionCheck.
  • We use the batch capabilities of the PensionCheck to perform several thousand annual recalculations in one processing day. That one feature alone has saved my staff a tremendous amount of time.
  • It would take my QDRO analyst an entire morning to assemble data and manually enter it into custom spreadsheets to determine the benefit amounts. PensionCheck performs the entire process in less than 10 seconds – what a time-saver!

Licensing:

Software licensing fees are based on the number of developer seats with a separate fee for the production server configuration, which can be a Windows NT, Windows 2000, or Windows XP platform.

User desktop licenses are free and unlimited in quantity.

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What Others are Saying

PensionCheck improved our ability to process pension applications 25 fold, and as a result over one-half of our pension analysts could be redeployed to other important business functions.
Lew DavisPension Director, B&C Trust Funds
We now allow call center representatives to send pension estimates to members without any review by our pension analysts – that’s how much confidence we have in the PensionCheck.
NameCEO, Business Name

Potomac Information Systems

Potomac Information Systems understands the software development challenges faced by today's organizations. We have used our expertise in the latest technologies, tools and techniques to develop a framework that organizations can use to rapidly develop enterprise, cloud capable software solutions. Our staff has wide-ranging backgrounds in Pension Administration, Membership, Healthcare, Government, Banking, Manufacturing, Distribution & Logistics, Education, and Property Management.

Solutions for:

Associations
Unions
Healthcare
Government
Mainframe Modernization

Products:
Evolve Application Framework®
TotalBenefits
PensionCheck

Contact

Potomac Information Systems, LLC
301 593 0658
info@potomacinfosystems.com
www.potomacinfosystems.com
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