MEDIA RELEASE
26 November 2009
Fidelity Life’s clients to benefit from faster underwriting process
Fidelity Life is one of four insurance partners involved in the initial nationwide rollout of electronic medical records
system SureMed this month, which is set to result in faster insurance applications for the insurer’s clients.
Delivered as part of the most recent update to Medtech’s Practice Management System (PMS), which is used by around 80
per cent of New Zealand’s general practices, SureMed will radically speed up medical insurance requests.
There are currently 87 practices across the country able to use the system and by Christmas we should have over 200
practices.
Milton Jennings, CEO Fidelity Life, says it used to take about three weeks on average to obtain additional medical
information from their client’s GP in order to underwrite their insurance policy application.
“The new SureMed system electronically manages the interaction with GPs and other health providers on behalf of insurers
and advisers, helping GPs to respond to insurance requests quickly and securely
“The speediness of this service is advantageous for both clients and advisers, and will create one of the most efficient
systems in the world for processing insurance applications.
“SureMed will help our advisors assess the 3,500 policy requests they receive per annum much faster, while utilising a
standardised approach to collecting medical information from GPs.
“It will create enormous efficiencies for GPs. Previous time spent filling out insurance forms will be eliminated,
allowing doctors to spend far more time with their patients.
“Most importantly, our clients will experience a faster turnaround time from policy application to policy issue,” says
Mr Jennings.
SureMed will deliver the client’s medical information via a secure encrypted form via Healthlink ensuring total privacy
for the client.
Developed throughout 2008 by New Zealand owned business process management firm, Konnect as part of a range of products
that make it easier for GPs to handle commercial transactions, SureMed was trialled by practices in Auckland’s ProCare
and other practices earlier this year, and the response from doctors to the launch of the service this month has been
very positive.
In future SureMed will be used for processing all claims.
ENDS