Approaches to Data Migration for Guidewire InsuranceSuite: BillingCenter

In Part One of this blog, I discussed some data migration approaches for Guidewire ClaimCenter®. In Part Two, I discussed some data migration approaches for Guidewire PolicyCenter®. In this final part, let’s examine some data migration approaches for our insurance billing system: Guidewire BillingCenter®.

Manual Approach: A manual approach can be followed for those insurers with smaller billing volumes . A manual migration consists of keying in active billing entries into the new system (BillingCenter) and retaining all historical billing data on the legacy system. While relatively inexpensive, there is a risk of keying errors and effort to manually balance the entry, plus both the legacy and new systems will run concurrently until the need to view billing records/statements or disconnecting from all legacy-connected systems is complete. Also, prior to retirement, the data in the legacy system will need to be saved into a data repository for safekeeping.

“Big Bang”: A “Big Bang” approach can also be followed for insurers who need to retire their legacy system as fast as possible and roll out BillingCenter in one phase. This has the potential for greater risk, as all the data must be cleansed and operationalized for the new system. Depending on the quality of the legacy data, there may be additional effort required to pass the data through more iterations than originally anticipated, resulting in project delay and additional cost.

Open Balance: This approach would transfer open balances as a single transaction to the new system, while all other transactions would remain in the legacy system. Any payments applied against an open balance would be done in the new system. This has relatively low risk and enables a “Big Bang” approach (i.e. one system for entry) without the additional effort to bring over historical transactions. Attention must be paid to create matching payment plans for BillingCenter and the legacy system.

Guidewire DataHub**™**: This is an extension of the Open Balance method, where the open balances would still be migrated directly to BillingCenter, but the history would be migrated to DataHub, Guidewire’s data warehouse. This avoids the complexity of operationalizing history with the advantage of retaining that history. This option might have additional value if there were multiple billing systems being migrated. Attention must be paid to create matching payment plans for BillingCenter and the legacy system.

Hopefully, the Claims, Policy, and Billing data migration approaches outlined in this blog series will prompt consideration and discussion by insurers in their journey towards a complete business transformation with Guidewire InsurancePlatform™ that includes retirement of their legacy systems.