Workers' Compensation Board of British Columbia
Workers' Compensation Board of British Columbia (WCB) Uses Microsoft Technology Architecture to Provide Online Service Delivery for Citizens and Cost Savings for the Employers of BC
|
|
Company Overview
With approximately 2,500 employees and 12 offices across the province, the WCB serves the needs of four distinct customer communities - employers, workers, healthcare providers and the health and safety community - and has been actively working to expand service to its constituents across the Internet.
Business Challenge
The primary goal of the WCB's e-business mandate was to provide a higher level of service for WCB's clients by eventually offering 80 percent of its products, goods and services on a 24/7 basis via an Internet portal. Supported by Microsoft technology, the WCB has now launched a number of online service delivery programs and has established connections with other government agencies such as the Canada Customs and Revenue Agency (CCRA). In order to successfully offer services online, the WCB needed to make a major investment in a new technology architecture, as well as supporting hardware and software, to be able to deploy Internet and Intranet applications. The organization required new technology that would ensure that its offerings were available to the public 24/7, and provided a high level of security given the sensitive nature of the information handled by the WCB. It was also crucial that the WCB's new technology environment would be able to grow over time to meet both evolving business needs and increasing external demands for new and expanded services from its customer communities. As a public sector agency, the WCB was cost-conscious and needed to select a solution that would meet both its business and technical needs, at a price that would ultimately create a low total cost of ownership for the WCB, and in turn the employers of British Columbia who fund the system.
|
Solution
When researching the available options for its technology architecture, the WCB consulted with industry analyst firms such as Giga and Gartner for guidance on what technology to use to meet their specific business and technology requirements. Staff examined a number of solutions, including Java-based technology and Microsoft, and assessed how each solution would enable the WCB to align their overall business goal of efficient service delivery and cost savings with their technology infrastructure needs. Another consideration for the WCB staff when examining their technology options was the availability of technical consultants who would be able to successfully build and support applications to meet the unique needs of their clients. "At the time, the WCB used Microsoft Office extensively so we were comfortable with Microsoft's offerings on the client side, and more importantly, the company's ability to deliver," recalled Brian Cooper, Executive Director, Information Services, WCB. "As a result, we felt that Microsoft's infrastructure offerings would enable us to align our business goals of online service delivery to our key stakeholders with our complex technology requirements." "In looking at our options, one of our key decision factors was the availability of individuals with a skill set to support either a Java or Microsoft-based solution. Microsoft clearly came out on top because the majority of the successful e-business solutions in Canada have been built using Microsoft technology. Based on this, and our experience with Microsoft, it was apparent that Microsoft was the right solution to meet our needs." WCB staff decided to base their n-Tier architecture, which moves application logic from the client back to the server, on Microsoft's Internet Data Center (IDC) model. The IDC model, which handles Internet transactional information functions for e-business, is designed to provide enterprises with an infrastructure for Internet service delivery today while being able to meet future needs for new services. WCB staff worked closely with the team at Microsoft headquarters in Redmond in the early stages of the implementation to customize the Internet Data Center model to meet their specific needs. "Based on the testing at the labs in Redmond, we felt that the Microsoft model was the right standard and the products were evolving in the right direction to meet both our business and technical needs," stated Brian Cooper, Executive Director, Information Services, WCB. "Every step of the way we assessed our options, and in terms of functionality versus cost and standardizing on one vendor, Microsoft was the right choice." The main implementation of the n-Tier architecture was completed in December 2002 and is now being used to support all Intranet and Internet based applications. The WCB's n-Tier architecture is utilizing a number of Microsoft products including Windows 2000 Advanced Edition, SQL Server 2000 Enterprise Edition, Application Center 2000, BizTalk Server 2002 with MQ Series and SQL Adapters, Microsoft Clustering Services and Microsoft Network Load Balancing. A key component of the WCB's solution was Application Center, a deployment and management tool for highly available Web applications, which would enable the WCB to simplify management of its servers by reducing application management complexity and managing many servers as one.
Business Benefits
The rollout of the n-Tier architecture and its supporting products has resulted in a higher level of customer service for the WCB's customer communities. Furthermore, the significant cost savings generated through online service delivery results in overall cost savings for not only the WCB, but also the citizens of BC.
Cost Savings Online
One of the WCB's first Internet initiatives is directed at the employer community. The WCB acts as an insurance company to employers who are registering, making payments and filing claims with the WCB. Some of the online applications the WCB has built to run on the n-Tier architecture to service the employer community include: registering for coverage, submission of payroll reports and paying insurance premiums, and clearance letter requests. The initiative for the employer community has already produced significant cost savings for the WCB and the employers of BC. The online clearance letter service illustrates the power of WCB's e-business initiative. A clearance letter, which is a letter requested by employers to find out if another employer is in good standings for subcontracting, is one of the most popular WCB services. Moving this process online has single-handedly made a significant improvement to the WCB's service delivery to the employer community. "Historically, the WCB issued approximately 130,000 clearance letters per year. Now, 90 percent of them are done electronically - meaning we can provide responses in about 10 seconds instead of days," said stated Sid Fattedad, Vice President of Finance/ISD and Chief Financial Officer, WCB . "With the move of the clearance letters online, the WCB is now issuing well in excess of 300,000 letters a year, many of which are issued outside of business hours. Where it previously cost the WCB about $2.00 per letter issued, it now costs ten cents to issue them online."
Faster, More Efficient Service Delivery
Since the WCB began moving employer services online, it has been able to provide service 24 hours per day, seven days a week instead of between 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m., while at the same time reducing the overall administrative cost of doing business. As a result, clients interfacing with the WCB now have greater convenience as they are able to access the services when they need them, this ultimately leads to faster, more efficient service delivery resulting in a higher level of customer satisfaction. The WCB offers its customers live phone support during business hours, and many of the calls are routine business tasks. "What we've experienced is that our phone lines are jammed with requests for things like address changes," stated Sid Fattedad, Vice President of Finance/ISD, WCB. "With the move to providing online service delivery, we anticipate that we'll be able to cut the number of calls in half and improve our ability to provide customer support by telephone."
Coordinating with Other Government Agencies
As part of its e-business mandate, the WCB started to coordinate with other government agencies, including CCRA, on the single business number initiative. Currently businesses in the province of British Columbia have a series of numbers they use with different government agencies. The CCRA is working to get all businesses across Canada using the business number issued by the CCRA as the standard number across the board. In order to share data with CCRA's applications pertaining to the single business number, the WCB needed to be able to connect their systems. The WCB selected BizTalk with its MQ Series and SQL Adapters to perform enterprise application integration with CCRA. Using BizTalk, the WCB can now securely exchange and share information with CCRA, while isolating the WCB's business applications to ensure their security, and therefore the integrity of the sensitive data handled by the WCB.
Meeting the WCB's Technology Goals
The WCB had very specific goals when establishing its n-Tier architecture - scalability, availability, security and manageability. Through its work with the Microsoft Consulting Services and support for testing in Redmond, the WCB was able to fully integrate all pieces of the architecture to meet its technology goals. "By having complete integration and standardizing on Microsoft, we've been able to save a lot of time, money and energy," said Allison Bourne, Senior Technology Architect, WCB. "We've been able to meet and exceed our initial goals for the n-Tier architecture every step of the way." The use of Microsoft Application Center was key to the WCB meeting its architecture goals. "Application Center provided a link between various aspects of our n-tier architecture," stated Johan Odendaal, Manager of Technology and Applications Architecture, WCB. "The linkages we were able to create using this solution were critical to our overall success."
Future Growth
Through the implementation of BizTalk and the integration with the CCRA, the WCB has been able to position the agency for future growth and expanded collaboration with other agencies. "Instead of having to build new infrastructures, BizTalk will make connecting with other agencies simple," said Johan Odendaal, WCB's Manager of Technology and Applications Architecture. "We will only need to make changes to the way we connect to other agencies, which will save us a significant number of man hours." Beyond the use of BizTalk Server, the WCB's use of Microsoft products as the basis for its technology architecture has positioned the agency for future growth in the delivery of its online service delivery mandate. Over the next year, the WCB will be doing pilot projects based on Microsoft's .NET framework and will be continuing to create and deploy applications to improve its service delivery to all of its customer communities including the ability to view claim cost statements and the creation of statistical reports on accidents and injuries throughout various industries. By standardizing on the Microsoft platform, the WCB has been able to realize significant costs savings quickly, based on a low total cost of ownership for its infrastructure. Ultimately, these cost savings enable the WCB to create a tangible return on investment for the statutory agency's customers - the employers and workers of BC.
For More Information
For more information about Microsoft products or services, call the Microsoft Sales Information Center at (800) 426-9400. In Canada, call the Microsoft Canada Co. information Centre at (800) 563-9048. Outside the 50 United States and Canada, please contact your local Microsoft subsidiary. To access information via the World Wide Web, go to: http://www.microsoft.ca/casestudies
http://www.worksafebc.com/ This case study is for informational purposes only. MICROSOFT MAKES NO WARRANTIES, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, IN THIS SUMMARY.
