Method and Apparatus for Pricing Insurance Policies

• US 20110071859A1
• Filed: 01/06/2010
• Published: 03/24/2011
• Est. Priority Date: 09/24/2009
• Status: Active Grant

• Current Assignee: Guidewire Software Incorporated
• Original Assignee: Guidewire Software Incorporated
• Inventors: Keefer, Alan Harrison
• Granted Patent: US 9,984,415 B2
• Time in Patent Office: Days
• US Class Current: 705/4
• CPC Class Codes: G06Q 40/08 Insurance

Abstract

An insurance policy management computing system (201) stores a legally-binding insurance policy as a read-only document including the complete policy history. To facilitate revisions to the policy, the computing system (201) provides an opportunity (202) to revise an insurance policy and recalls (203) the currently legally-binding insurance policy. Since the legally-binding insurance policy is a read-only document, the computing system (201) uses the legally-binding policy to generate an editable version that is a complete copy of the legally-binding policy. Once the editable version of the insurance policy has been generated, the input revisions can be incorporated into the policy and then, the revised version of the insurance policy is saved as a read-only, now-current version of the insurance policy. The new legally-binding insurance policy has a new creation and effective dates of the various policy elements. To evaluate the insurance policy, the most recently bound legally-binding insurance policy is accessed and that document contains the currently effective policy, as well as the policy history.

Claims

1-21. -21. (canceled)

22. An apparatus for repricing an insurance policy premium, the apparatus comprising:

an end-user interface;

a memory having stored therein an insurance policy comprised of a plurality of policy elements having corresponding effective dates and at least some of the plurality of policy elements having a fixed identifier associated therewith, wherein the fixed identifiers are consistent across various stored versions of an insurance policy such that corresponding policy elements have corresponding fixed identifiers;

a processor operably coupled to the end-user interface and the memory, the processor configured to;

receive revisions to a current version of the insurance policy;

modify the current version of the insurance policy to create an updated version of the insurance policy;

generate a policy price based on the updated version of the insurance policy by summing prorated costs for slices of the updated version, the slices based on the plurality of policy elements; and

compare the policy price based on the updated version with a corresponding stored policy price corresponding to the current version of the insurance policy to determine a difference in the insurance policy premium between the current version and the updated version of the insurance policy.

23. The apparatus of claim 22 wherein generating a policy price comprises creating slices of the insurance policy that are defined by at least one of the start effective dates and the end effective dates of the policy elements, wherein each such slice has at least one cost corresponding to the policy elements of that slice, wherein the costs are prorated according to the effective dates of the slice and then the prorated costs are aggregated to generate the policy price.

24. The apparatus of claim 23 wherein the costs having identical rates for adjacent slices are combined to yield a combined cost and then the combined costs are prorated based on a portion of a policy term that the adjacent slices cover.

25. The apparatus of claim 22 wherein determining a difference in the insurance policy premium between the current version and the updated version further includes comparing the policy price based on the updated version with a total sum of all prior financial transactions generated for a time period by previous versions of the insurance policy.

26. The apparatus of claim 22 wherein the insurance policy stored in the memory further includes separate cost entities that have a start effective date and an end effective date.

27. The apparatus of claim 26 wherein comparing the policy price based on the updated version of the insurance policy with a stored policy price comprises comparing the separate cost entities for the updated version with the separate cost entities for the current version.

28. The apparatus of claim 27 wherein comparing the policy price based on the updated version of the insurance policy with a stored policy price of the current version of the insurance policy further comprises locating cost entities that correspond to identical policy elements by examining a fixed identifier for each of the cost entities.

29. The apparatus of claim 28 wherein the processor is further configured to produce offsetting and onsetting transactions when the cost entities for the updated version and the current version of the policy differ.

30. The apparatus of claim 29 wherein when the processor determines that a cost entity is present only in the current version of the policy, only offsetting transactions are generated as pertain to that circumstance.

31. The apparatus of claim 29 wherein when a processor determines that a cost entity is only present in the updated version of the policy, only onsetting transactions are generated as pertain to that circumstance.

32. The apparatus of claim 29 wherein for periods of effective time where the cost entities match exactly, no offsetting and no onsetting transactions are generated.

33. The apparatus of claim 26 wherein the start effective date and the end effective date of the separate cost entities may differ from the corresponding effective dates of the plurality of policy elements.

34. The apparatus of claim 26 wherein at least one of the separate cost entities corresponds to a price as applies to an element for a slice.

35. The apparatus of claim 26 wherein at least one of the separate cost entities corresponds to a price as applies to the policy as a whole without being directly related to a particular policy element.

36. The apparatus of claim 35 wherein a price comprises at least one of:

a policy fee; and

a policy discount.

37. The apparatus of claim 26 wherein the separate cost entities that are adjacent to one another in effective time and have identical values are merged into a combined cost entity that spans for a combined effective time.

38. An apparatus for pricing an insurance policy premium, the apparatus comprising:

an end-user interface;

a memory having stored therein an insurance policy comprised of a plurality of policy elements having corresponding effective dates and at least some of the policy elements having a fixed identifier associated therewith, wherein the fixed identifiers are consistent across various stored versions of an insurance policy such that corresponding policy elements have corresponding fixed identifiers;

a processor operably coupled to the end-user interface and the memory, the processor configured to;

create a separate cost entity that represent pricing information for at least one of the policy elements, the separate cost entities having a start effective date and an end effective date that correspond to the effective dates of the policy elements upon creation; and

generate a policy price based on summation of the separate cost entities.

39. The apparatus of claim 38 wherein the processor is configured to produce an onsetting transaction to account for the policy price.

40. A method for pricing an insurance policy, the method comprising:

at an insurance policy management computing system;

providing an end user, via an end-user interface to the insurance policy management computing system, with an opportunity to revise a current version of an insurance policy, wherein the insurance policy comprises a plurality of policy elements having corresponding effective dates;

modifying the current version of the insurance policy to create an updated version of the insurance policy, the updated version having updated policy element effective dates;

generating an updated policy price based on the updated version of the insurance policy by generating slices of the policy, the slices being defined by at least one of the updated policy element effective dates; and

comparing the updated policy price with a stored policy price corresponding to the current version of the insurance policy to determine a difference in insurance policy premium between the current version and the updated version of the insurance policy, wherein the updated policy price and the stored policy price are comprised of discretely stored cost entities.

41. The method of claim 40 further comprising storing separate cost entities that have a start effective date and an end effective date.

42. The method of claim 41 wherein generating an updated policy price comprises creating slices based on the updated insurance policy, the slices being defined by at least one of the updated policy element effective dates.

43. The method of claim 42 further comprising pricing each slice as if the price applied for an entire policy period and aggregating cost entities that have identical rates and are adjacent to one another in effective time.

44. The method of claim 43 further comprising prorating the cost entities of the slices of the policy based on an actual portion of a policy term that the slice is effective.