Redesigning Home Office Cash to reduce employee task times by 2X and increase engagement by 50%
Project Goals: Reduce paper and streamline accounting processes.
My role: I took lead on design and additional research.
Collaborated with: Development teams, UX teams, Fin-ops teams, Accounting and underwriters.
Deliverables: Reduced internal employee task times by 2X via redesigns of internal tools like Home Office Cash. Increased employee engagement by 50% via redesigns of internal HR tools and processes.
Lost money and wasted time
Shelter Insurance's accounting department and underwriting teams were struggling with a critical paper-based process. When customers sent checks to the home office, teams used paper cash slips to track where money should be allocated. These cash slips were either filled manually or auto-generated from an internal e-commerce application, then routed through internal mail - creating multiple failure points.
The real impact
• Missing money due to lost or misplaced cash slips
• Time waste from accounting teams searching for
lost paperwork
• Customer frustration when payments weren't
applied to correct policies
• Manual rework when cash slips needed to be
recreated
Building on Previous Research
I inherited this project from my supervisor, who had conducted initial user interviews and created basic wireframes. Rather than starting from scratch, I strategically built upon existing insights while identifying gaps that needed deeper investigation.
Expanding the Research Foundation
After reviewing the initial interviews and wireframes, I conducted additional conversations with several people in accounting and underwriting to validate and expand our understanding.
Key Pain Points Confirmed:
• Paper processes created vulnerability to loss and misplacement
• Internal mail routing caused delays and delivery failures
• Time spent hunting for missing cash slips disrupted daily
workflows
• Manual recreation of lost documents added unnecessary work
Opportunities Identified:
• Digitize the entire paper process
• Enable real-time payment processing
• Reduce customer impact from processing errors
• Eliminate paper waste and associated costs
Streamlined processes
By building the home office cash application, it cut task times immensely.
"13 returns in 10 minutes. That includes spot checking the mainframe to make sure the cash item cleared."
"It helps underwriting immensely too. RSAs are done in minutes and not days."
Pamela Sextro-Kelly
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