Public/Private Partnership Improves Case Management for Workers Comp Agencies
By Chandler Harris
During a 2003 workers' compensation board meeting in Vancouver, Canada, Steve Barnett, vice president and assistant chief financial officer of WorkSafeBC (WSBC), started chatting with Valerie Adamo, CIO of the Ontario Workplace Safety and Insurance Board (WSIB). The two executives found they had a common business interest: the desire to revamp their work force database and operations systems. Their conversation eventually led to a highly successful public-private partnership (PPP).
"We found it was a good fit between us and Ontario collaborating," Barnett said. "That's unique because Ontario and British Columbia (BC) are a long way apart, and we tend to view ourselves as unique. But it didn't take long to understand we're in the same business and we do things similarly - so it became natural."
WSBC and the WSIB are the workers' compensation agencies for British Columbia and Ontario, respectively, but they also perform other services, such as workplace injury prevention programs, and health-care and rehabilitation monitoring.
At the beginning of the collaboration, WSBC and the WSIB had systems that were built in the late-1980s, which lacked a comprehensive intelligence- and evidence-based case management system. Instead, they focused solely on paying workers' benefits. The WSBC had five legacy systems and several other reporting applications that made streamlining and integrating information a challenge.
Instead of building a new case-management system from the ground up, the partners decided to look for software vendors willing to commit to a PPP - a collaboration between municipal and private institutions in which each partner shares the risks and rewards of corporation.
"We looked at it and said, 'If we build it together and split the cost, we'll still be ahead because we're sharing the cost,'" Adamo said. "My team has expertise in vendor management, contracts and negotiations, and deal structuring. BC took the lead to determine the requirement process and how we would get the job done."
The team researched vendors and found Cúram Software, which provides enterprise social-management solutions. Cúram's social-justice and benefits programs were similar to the case-management solutions the PPP was seeking. Although Cúram didn't have a workers' compensation product, the company had a product suite with vertically integrated solutions that included unemployment insurance and food stamps. Adamo and Barnett determined there was enough content in Cúram's software for a successful customization.
The Dublin, Ireland, software company agreed to a public-private partnership with the WSIB and WSBC to develop the Cúram Workers' Compensation solution, which enables workers' compensation agencies to effectively manage end-to-end claims by providing comprehensive and efficient benefits-delivery capabilities. Although the WSIB and WSBC agreed to pay development costs, and Cúram would own the software, the two public organizations established a royalty agreement to receive lower support costs whenever Cúram sells the new software. Another benefit for the municipalities was future software development by the company's experts at reduced cost.
The company benefited from the PPP by working closely with both municipal infrastructures to create a successful Workers' Compensation software solution. The program provides automated claims processing, eligibility and entitlement assessments, task and caseload management, claims classification and service planning.
"By collaborating with two large, innovative workers' compensation organizations, we were able to ensure best-practice business process enablement capabilities were incorporated into Cúram Workers' Compensation," said Ernie Connon, president of Cúram Software, in an official release. "The solution provides case workers with a holistic view of each applicant's claim, resulting in more efficient benefit determination and delivery, resulting in effective citizen service."