Voice over Internet Protocol (VoIP) continues to grow rapidly in both consumer and business markets. For businesses, VoIP offers cost savings through reduced long-distance charges and combining voice and data networks. It also provides increased functionality by allowing employees to work remotely with a good internet connection. During disasters or increased call volumes, VoIP can provide an on-demand call center solution. As VoIP and its applications mature, businesses will see additional benefits beyond basic phone functionality.

1. BEST’S REVIEW
Technology Insight
June 2007
Technology
v oice over internet protocol provide a viable “just-in-time” call
By service or voip, continues to center option. in this scenario, addi-
Gates Ouimette ramp up quickly in both the tional agents can immediately join
consumer and business worlds.the the insurer’s call-center agent pool,
business voip market is expected to whether the pool is insourced or
leap to almost $3.3 billion by 2010, outsourced, to handle the uptick in
from $840 million by the end of 2005, associated claims activity.
according to a recent report released the value proposition using this
by information technology and market just-in-time model for voip is not lim-
research advisory firm Yankee Group. ited to disaster activity. For example,
while this growth is phenomenal, if an insurance marketing campaign
what makes it even more interesting is launched and becomes more
is the perception in some technol- successful than originally planned,
ogy circles that compatibility issues adding just-in-time staff to support
campaign-related inquiries
A Powerful Voice
can yield improved customer
satisfaction and additional
revenue.
As voip continues to
mature from both a technol-
Insurers are discovering between voip vendors have suppos- ogy and insurance industry adoption
edly slowed growth. perspective, business benefits also will
cost savings and increased For those unfamiliar with the tech- mature beyond the basic aspect of hav-
functionality from Voice over nology,voip is, in more common terms, ing incoming phone calls automatically
Internet Protocol service. telephone service over the internet. if routed to an individual voip phone,
you have a reasonable-quality internet wherever it gets plugged into the net-
connection at home, phone service work.
delivered through your internet con- examples of this voip application
nection becomes a viable option. maturation exist in collaboration prod-
in terms of business use, key ucts integrated with industry-leading
voip drivers fall into two major e-mail platforms, including Microsoft
buckets—cost savings and increased exchange and iBM Lotus notes. swit-
functionality—when compared to zerland’s iscoord created is-phone, a
more traditional telephone systems. “soft phone” (a pC with voip software
From a cost perspective, savings result used as a phone) for notes and its
from decreasing long-distance charges sister instant messaging product, iBM
domestically and internationally, and Lotus sametime. in addition to provid-
As VoIP matures from combining voice and data network ing a single, integrated “phone book,”
both a technology and infrastructure. (combining notes contact record and
insurance industry adop- More importantly to businesses sametime iM addresses) functionality
is the increased functionality result- within is-phone includes voice record-
tion perspective, business ing from voip implementations. ing and storage on demand.Another
benefits will mature. examples include the flexibility of example of a voip application is using
employees being able to work from that same voip network not only for
anywhere with a good internet con- voice and data, but also for faxing,
nection, giving them data connectiv- using standards for Fax over ip .
ity and, more importantly, full phone while the largest, global insurers
connectivity. are well along the voip path, other
in an extreme situation such insurers, both midsize and small, are
as a natural disaster, a voip solution also experiencing voip benefits.As
can help ease disaster management insurers such as Axa and eMC insur-
of internal systems by it staff or ance Cos. continue to experience
success with voip it’s important for
,
Gates Ouimette is a Best’s Review col- insurance business executives to
understand the potential impact of
umnist from Massachusetts. He can
be reached at gateso@yahoo.com. voip on their companies today. BR
1 Best’s Review • june 2007 • RepRint
Copyright © 2008 by A.M. Best Company, inc. All Rights Reserved. Reprinted with permission.