InsureKit Agency Software - User's Guide

Last Updated: May 1, 2003

System Requirements:
InsureKit Agency will operate on Windows 2000 and XP, Windows 98 and Windows ME. InsureKit Agency will not operate on Macintosh, Lindows, or Unix computers.

InsureKit requires an internet connection to present forms, email forms, or create a PDF of a form.

Welcome to the InsureKit Agency Software Users Guide! Let's take a moment to become familiar with the software, then we'll explore how to use InsureKit most effectively.

Once you have launched and logged into the software, you will be presented with your blank two-paned workspace. The left pane is for managing individual forms within a package. The right pane is for viewing the form you have selected. What are Packages? Packages, or Form Packages, consist of 1 or more forms that are treated as a unit.

Most of the buttons and functions of InsureKit will only become available to you once you have selected a form and saved data on it.

The options available now are:

File Menu

• New Package - Allows you to open a new form, or a package of forms.
• Open Package - Allows you to open an existing form or package of forms.
• Printer Setup - Allows you to open the printer setup dialogue box.
• Close - Exits InsureKit Agency Software.

View Menu

• Toolbar - Shows/hides the row of buttons under the menus.
• Status Bar - Shows/hides the Status Bar at the bottom of the workspace.

Tools Menu

• Batch Print - Allows printing of several forms or packages.
• Manage Account - Allows you to manage your published form packages.

Help Menu

• Instructions - The InsureKit Users Guide.
• Support - Contact information for InsureKit support.
• Home Page - InsureHub, the home of online ACORD forms.
• About - Version information for InsureKit.

Two of the buttons beneath the menus are also now available:

• New - Corresponds to 'New Package', found in the File Menu
• Open - Corresponds to 'Open Package', found in the File Menu

To Begin Using InsureKit Agency

Start by selecting New Package from the File Menu, or by clicking on the New button. This will call up a window listing all the Individual ACORD forms you can work with in the InsureKit Agency software. The columns can be sorted by the headers at the top: Name, Effective Date, Source, or Source ID (which is the number by which the form is most commonly known, such as ACORD_130 for the Worker's Compensation form).

Click on the form you wish to work with, and then on the OK button. The form itself will appear in the right pane of the workspace, and an icon for it will appear in the left pane.

Enter data onto the form, and Print or Save it as you wish.

Saving Form Data

With a click of a button you can save the data you have entered on the form. InsureKit Agency allows you to manage your form information in your own way. The Save dialogue box enables you to navigate to anyplace on your computer or network, and always starts from the directory into which you installed InsureKit Agency. Name your saved form data and click Save. This form and its data can now be retrieved using the Open button (or the corresponding File Menu command Open).

Once you have entered data onto the form you chose, you can also save it under numerous names. This allows the user to set up forms in advance with persistent data, such as the Producer information.

Printing Form Data

Also, with the click of a button you can print the filled-in form with automatically adjusted margins, so you never need worry about your form printing properly.

Some printers, however, simply cannot be set to print at the required margins. In this event, all you need to do is create a PDF of your form and then use the very powerful printing capabilites of Adobe Acrobat Reader to Scale your form or simply Fit To Page Size. With InsureKit you can always print your forms perfectly.

Once Data is saved onto a form, you will see that you are now able to do things with the form that you were not able to do before: Email & Create PDF.

Emailing Forms

When you are ready to email your form, simply click the Email button and you will be presented with a blank email that includes all the common email fields such as To, cc, bcc, Subject, Message, and Attachments. You are also able to designate which email address you want your email sent from - - and InsureKit will then ask if you wish to make that your default address for emailing.

Once your email is sent, the form is turned into a PDF which is then attached to the email. The recipient then need only open the attached PDF to view the form with data as you prepared it. Also, once you email is on its way, the email window is reset so that you can send the form again to a different email address and include a different message & attachments if you desire.

Create PDF

PDFs of your filled in forms can be a benefit to you for a variety of reasons, such as if your printer seems unable to handle the required margins as set by InsureKit, you wish to have digital copies of those forms on disk, or burned onto CD for archiving.

Creating a PDF from a filled-in InsureKit form is as easy as clicking the PDF button on the toolbar. Once clicked, your form is transformed into an Adobe Acrobat PDF file in about a minute. Once the conversion has been completed, Adobe Acrobat Reader will be launched and the form will appear inside a new window within InsureKit, leaving your original form open and editable.

Now that you have become familiar with how to InsureKit to work with a single form, let's look at how InsureKit Agency enables you to set-up and manage forms in ways that have never been possible before.

Manage Account

Using the Manage Account feature of InsureKit, you are able to set up packages of forms which you can then name as you like. Simply put, this enables a producer to group together a package of forms for car insurance, homeownership, or any other line of business that you handle. These forms can always be called up together, filled-in and printed as a set. InsureKit will even check each form to determine whether you have entered data on it before printing.

Once you have the hang of working with single files, you'll quickly discover that its much easier to set up a few packages of your most commonly used forms rather than look through a list of 400 or more forms everytime you wish to call up that one you always seem to use.

To begin setting up your own packages, use the Tools Menu to call up the Manage Accounts dialogue box. When you first call up this feature you will see your own account information with InsureKit, as well as a window below that information with nothing in it, and some buttons to the right of that window: Add, Remove, Properties, and Publish.

When you click the Add button you are presented with a new dialogue box in wich you can name this packaged set of forms, designate it with a Source Id or nickname, and an effective date to help you more easily manage your date sensitive form packages.

In the window beneath that information is where you will choose forms to add to your package. Here the Add button will call up a list of ACORD forms under a tab called Individual ACORDS. Once you have set up a few packages you will see that they are also listed under their own tab. This allows you to set up other packages that are similar to a package you have already set up without having to go through the process of selecting each form each time.

Once you have selected all the forms you think you need for this package, click the Create button. You can still add or delete forms with a Created Package, but not a Published one.

To add or delete forms from a Created Package, click the name of the package, then click the Properties button. Here you will see a number of features including add and remove form, and buttons to change the order of the forms within the package. You can modify your package in this way as much and as often as you like. When you have no need to make further changes to that package, Publish it.

Publishing Packages

Once your package has been Published it cannot be changed, only deleted. To open the Published package click the New button. In addition to the Individual ACORDS you will also now see a tab for Form Packages. Click any of your Published packages to open all the forms in that package.

Now, you see the real power of the left pane of the InsureKit workspace as that is where all the individual ACORDs that make up your package are listed. Switching between forms is as easy as clicking the forms listed in the left pane.

Again, fill in only the ones you need to. When you print or email, only the forms you have entered information on will be printed or emailed.

Batch Printing

Under the Tools Menu there is a feature that allows you to print forms from more than one package at a time. By selecting Batch Print you will be given the option to choose packages from anywhere on your computer or network. Then simply click the Print All button to send all the forms to the printer together. Again, remember, only forms with data on them will be printed.

Send/Receive

Those are used inconjunction with external processes... for example, if you had a website where a potential insured filled-out a questionaire for homeowners insurance and then submitted the request.... InsureKit could map that information onto the ACORD 80 and drop it into your received queue. When you grabbed from your queue, you'd see the ACORD 80 with the insured's data prefilled.

The submit button would be used to give the form (in an editable state) to another person, to continue working on or to review and correct.

These are special features built into InsureKit, but not needed by most InsureKit users. If you think that this feature is right for your business, please contact us to discuss enabling your system.