Customer Case Studies

Palette Health Insurance Society Using HULFT-WebConnect

Contributing Significantly to a Reduction in the Burden Associated with Mailing Procedures and Retention of Documents

HULFT-WebConnect Enables Secure Data Transfer

At Palette Health Insurance Society (hereinafter, “the health insurance society”), which was established in 1964 under the Seibu Distribution Group, HULFT-WebConnect, provided by Saison Information Systems, is used for some of the data transactions that are necessary for performing procedures to add or remove policyholders from the health insurance of a member business office when an employee is hired or leaves the company. This has successfully enabled the health insurance society to reduce the time and labor that were needed to perform these data transactions by using conventional magnetic media, and to create a secure environment for data transfer.


USER PROFILE

Palette Health Insurance Society was established in 1964 as the health insurance society of the Seibu Distribution Group. Although it no longer has capital ties to the group, the health insurance society currently has approximately 100 member companies in fields such as retail and dining. As an independent health insurance society, the Palette Health Insurance Society insures approximately 90,000 people, including employees of the member companies and their dependents, making it a large-scale organization among health insurance societies throughout Japan. The health insurance society is currently in the implementation stage of phase two of their data health plan, and is taking an active approach to preventing its members’ symptoms from becoming serious, by performing a comparative analysis of receipt data against examination data.

Mr. Yoichi Aizawa
Managing Director
Palette Health Insurance Society

Ms. Michiko Hirose
Manager
Palette Health Insurance Society


Background: Searching for a Mechanism for Exchanging Information over a Network


Palette Health Insurance Society was established in 1964 as the health insurance society of the Seibu Distribution Group. Today, it has approximately 100 member companies in fields such as retail and dining. As an independent insurance society, Palette Health Insurance Society insures approximately 90,000 people, including employees of the member companies and their dependents, making it a large-scale organization among health insurance societies. At this health insurance society, procedures are carried out to add or remove policyholders from the health insurance of a member business office when an employee is hired or leaves the company. These procedures were previously carried out via postal mail, by using magnetic media such as DVDs.

On the other hand, Japan’s National Health Insurance system (a similar health insurance society operated by the Japan Health Insurance Association) and the Japan Pension Service (an extra-departmental government organization) had been exchanging data over a network by using electronic statements since about 2001. Mr. Yoichi Aizawa, Palette Health Insurance Society’s managing director, looks back on the situation at the time. “We were also considering methods for securely exchanging data over a network,” he says, “in order to reduce the burden on our member business offices, as well as to prevent incidents related to sending information through the mail.” Around the same time, the Individual Number (My Number) system took effect as a way to manage individual numbers. This also encouraged the health insurance society to consider mechanisms for enabling the smooth exchange of data in a secure environment.


With TLS communications to encrypt data at all times Secure communication environment


On the cloud
No data is left


Printing document and putting them into envelopes
Simplified tasks

Introduction: Benefitting from the Ability to Set Up Secure Data Transfers with No Burden on Member Business Offices


At this point, HULFT-WebConnect, provided by Saison Information Services, caught the attention of the health insurance society. The health insurance society had already been using HULFT for some of their mission-critical systems, and they were extremely satisfied with HULFT’s reliability. It is for this very reason that they began to wonder if they could use HULFT technology to implement secure data transactions. The health insurance society was then newly introduced to HULFT-WebConnect, which would allow them to communicate securely over the internet and to implement this communication by simply executing a batch file, with no need to set up a special environment at their member business offices.

Although the health insurance society had considered using a cloud-type file sharing service to exchange data over the internet, concerns had been raised about the fact that data would be stored on a hard disk on the cloud. “By using HULFT-WebConnect,” says manager Ms. Michiko Hirose, “we would be able to implement a mechanism that doesn’t leave any data on the cloud. Furthermore, we would be able to use TLS communications to encrypt data at all times. We thought it would give us peace of mind when it came to implementing a secure environment.” The health insurance society also considered that, if data were stored even temporarily in a specific environment, the service itself might need to be monitored. They were concerned about the amount of time and labor that this would take. Because they knew that they might want to use the mechanism to exchange an even wider variety of data in the future, they were also impressed with the fact that HULFT-WebConnect would allow them to send and receive data regardless of the file format.

As a result, HULFT-WebConnect was chosen as the integration platform for personal information, including individual numbers, used for transactions between the health insurance society and its member business offices.


Result: Providing Significant Benefits Not Only to the Health Insurance Society, but Also to Its Member Business Offices


Under the current operations, each member business office places files containing the information necessary for the applicable procedures in a specific folder on a PC in their office, and executes a batch file to send the information to the health insurance society. In addition, after the procedures are complete, the health insurance society stores information such as calculated interest rates and a breakdown of any increases or decreases in a PDF file located in a specific folder. The member business offices can then acquire this information when they need it (such as on the last day of the business month) by executing a batch file. HULFT-WebConnect can be used not only for transactions related to adding new policyholders, but also for address changes, transactions related to individual numbers, and more. To meet the demands of its member business offices, the health insurance society plans to continue to expand, as needed, the switch from transactions performed by using DVDs and other magnetic media to transactions performed by using HULFT-WebConnect.

By using HULFT-WebConnect, the member business offices enjoy benefits such as lower costs and reduced labor, as a result of no longer needing to prepare magnetic media, pay postal fees, or perform tasks associated with sending media through the mail or retaining documents. Similarly, the health insurance society, which no longer needs to print breakdowns of increases and decreases in insurance premiums, put documents into envelopes, or perform other tasks associated with mail-based transactions, also benefits from this simplification of tasks. With HULFT-WebConnect, the health insurance society has successfully constructed a mechanism that is effective for all parties involved. Previously, in order to annually submit to the health insurance society applications to calculate the insurance premiums of each of their policyholders, each member business office needed to print and mail many breakdowns of increases and decreases in insurance premiums. Now, however, they are able to accomplish the same task by simply sending PDF files. According to Ms. Hirose, “We have received positive feedback from our member business offices, because they can easily integrate this mechanism with successive systems, such as HR systems, and because they no longer need to secure the physical space for retaining paper documents. They are also extremely satisfied with the fact that data transactions can be performed safely, with no need to be aware of the system.” The key to this praise comes from the fact that the member business offices do not need to prepare a special environment in order to carry out communications.

However, not all physical documents have been digitized, because paper documents equivalent to cover forms containing the official seal of the member business offices must still be sent separately by mail. Looking ahead to future developments, Mr. Aizawa says, “We are currently reviewing our administrative procedures, and we believe that the digitalization of documents related to insurance will continue to progress. When this happens, the value of using HULFT-WebConnect will increase even further.”

The health insurance society also says that, in the future, they hope to use HULFT-WebConnect for the exchange of data such as the data related to the specified health checkups that are required as part of phase two of the data health plan that the health insurance society is actively promoting. Ms. Hirose speaks of future expansion, saying, “If a policyholder has their specified health checkup at a medical facility with which we do not have a contract, the results of that checkup are sent to the member business office, and the member business office must then send them to us. I hope we will also be able to use HULFT-WebConnect in situations such as these. We should be able to make versatile use of this mechanism, because data can be transferred regardless of the file format.”

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