PDF Validator verifies electronic insurance applications
Insurance applications at ARAG are increasingly being submitted via electronic means. In order to ensure that the insurance applications comply with the required PDF/A standard, the documents have to be validated by means of a gatekeeper-software. The decision was made in favor of the 3-Heights™ PDF Validator.
Application requirements
Insurance applications at ARAG are increasingly being submitted via electronic means. A signature pad, with which electronically signed applications can be created in the PDF/A archiving format and digitally signed directly at the point of sales, i.e. at the customer’s location, has been in use since October 2011.
These PDF/A documents should, in addition to the display format (currently TIFF-G4) be archived as originals. In order to ensure that the insurance applications comply with the required PDF/A standard, the documents have to be validated by means of a gatekeeper-software.
To achieve this, ARAG IT required a robust, reliable and high-performance solution, which supports the new PDF/A-2 standard. The decision fell to the 3-Heights® PDF Validator, thanks to its easy to integrate Java interface as well as the excellent support that the customer could rely on during the evaluation phase. In addition, support for the new ISO Standard for PDF/A-2 was already available within 14 days of its official release.
Customer benefits
Electronic insurance applications were previously transferred as normal PDF documents, resulting in the necessity for a hand-written signature on paper. This process has been simplified with the implementation of the Signature Pad and the change to PDF/A format.
Today, there is only one single PDF/A document, which also contains the signature. ARAG has the comfort of knowing that the archived PDF documents meet the ISO Standard for PDF/A and can be submitted for long-term archiving.
The implementation of this project resulted in a shorter processing time for receiving and processing insurance application coupled with a reduction in effort.
Implementation
Integration of the 3-Heights® PDF Validator was carried out on a Linux server and the embedding of the Java interface in ARAG IT’s 3rd party module repository. The PDF/A Validator was installed on two physically independent Linux systems, providing for redundancy coverage in case of outage.
The PDF files are transferred over to both of these systems, where the 3-Heights® PDF Validator is called out. The Validator first verifies the documents against PDF/A-2b. If this check fails, the documents are verified against PDF/A-1b. If this check also fails, the Validator reports the failure
Products for this case
Brief portrait of ARAG IT GmbH
ARAG, the largest family business amongst German insurers, is one of the biggest suppliers of legal matters and protection worldwide. As an internationally acclaimed, independent partner for legal matters and protection, the ARAG Corporation in Germany offers a wide variety of insurances and is Europe’s largest sport insurer. ARAG IT is responsible for ARAG’s IT systems, which includes productive operations as well as individual enhancements and integration.