Private healthcare is a growing business within the UK. Here we explain how PPP healthcare, one of the largest organisations in this area, is using WITNESS to help improve efficiency.

PPP healthcare, part of GRE, is a leading provider of private medical insurance in the UK. Recognising the need to maintain it's competitive edge, PPP healthcare invested in WITNESS. The system was purchased for the organisation's Business Improvement team who would use it both to help with day-to-day planning and for strategic projects commissioned by other PPP healthcare departments.

The first project for which WITNESS was used was a review of personal customer call handling. With management targeted to improve both telephone response timings and correspondence turnaround, the objective of the project was to identify the optimum number of staff required in order to meet target service levels. Mike Tinsley, Business Implementation Manager comments "it was (and remains!) crucial that our staffing levels were sufficient to ensure that we deliver excellent service to our customers. WITNESS would show us exactly how our stringent service objectives could be met".

Modelling Reality

When constructing the WITNESS model, PPP healthcare were able to take into account all variables affecting efficiency. They began by examining incoming calls. The company operates a customer freephone line in addition to the normal switchboard number. Personal Advisers pick up calls from either line but priority is given to the paying callers. WITNESS took this information into account as well as operational information such as the number of Personal Advisers and hours worked, and a model was built which represented the operation and accurately predicted the organisation's current service levels. ´What.if?´ experimentation then revealed the number of staff members and shift patterns needed to hit target customer service levels

Flexibity

The results of the first modelling project were so well received that the Business Improvement Team quickly found itself inundated with requests for ´what-ifs?´ e.g. what would happen if call volumes increased by 10%, or if staff levels fell due to sickness. As a result, in order to provide a set of results which would be of use to all, WITNESS was used to produce a table which showed the total number of Personal Advisers required to meet any given target service level for any given level of calls within a thirty minute period (as that is the level at which the planning is carried out). The resulting ´ready reckoner´ was output into Lotus 123 and is now used by call centre managers as a quick reference to decide upon the number of Personal Advisers needed per shift as call volumes change.

Using WITNESS As Pan Of A Wider Exercise

Based on the success of the first projects, the Business Improvement team was then commissioned to review the Tunbridge Wells postroom operation. Each document entering the post room is scanned on arrival and processed electronically thereafter. The Tunbridge Wells site operates one of the largest workflow systems in Europe, introducing 15,000 documents into the system daily.

This project was targeted at improving the efficiency, effectiveness and economy of the postroom operation. A secondary issue was how best to handle the scanning and indexing of documents for archiving which are mainly created internally subsequent to the arrival of the initial customer communication.

Identifying The Problem

A detailed WITNESS model was produced to show performance in all areas. The model showed clearly that the main barrier to improving performance was the result of inappropriate deployment of staff skills across shifts. This was exacerbated by the company policy of ensuring that new correspondence is scanned and indexed on the day of arrival. As a result, within the postroom, priority is given to new correspondence at the detriment of the archiving process.

Staggering Results

At this point, the ´what-if?´ process began in earnest as the team began to experiment with different shift patterns and staff numbers in arder to improve service levels and reduce outstanding work levels. Experimentation showed that changing shift patterns would have a dramatic effect on service levels. A secondary benefit was the identification of operational areas, which could benefit from small changes. For example, it was identified that documents were being date stamped twice when only one stamping was required, thus making considerable time savings.

All recommended changes were implemented in May 1997 with some staggering results. The most impressive result was a dramatic reduction in overtime requirements. Over the period of one year, PPP healthcare reduced overtime by 13 Full Time Equivalent employees. The most impressive fact was that this reduction was achieved at the same time as increasing volumes of work. The net effect was a 70% increase in productivity.

Mike Tinsley Says, "the benefits were even better than anticipated. WITNESS paid for itself many times over in this project alone and given its success rate, will be used to improve efficiency elsewhere in the company."

WITNESS is currently being used to assist with planning the merger of PPP healthcare's three sites into a single operation based in Tunbridge Wells.