DJCS Claims Management

The Department of Justice and Community Safety (DJCS) administers a claims management system for local councils to claim eligible costs associated with expenses incurred from providing relief and recovery to the community following natural disasters. In a similar process to private insurance, Victoria’s 79 local councils can submit claims for reimbursement through an online system and once approved, they receive payment from a joint federal and state funding arrangement.

The Challenge

At any one time, there can be several natural disasters occurring simultaneously, increasing the volume of claims through the system and requiring significant resource from the assessors and the DJCS team.

The DJCS needed to upgrade their claims management system as their legacy system based on Lotus Notes was reaching end of life and was no longer fit for purpose. As well as being difficult to use, it ran on outdated technologies and was lacking in modern security features.

In order to meet the increasing need for complex workflows and process automation, the department began scoping a future-ready solution in 2022, choosing to partner with Mav3rik for the transformation.

“Under the department’s requirements of using the state purchase panel, we considered several providers, and ultimately chose Mav3rik for their understanding of the project’s nuanced requirements. They had the skill sets we were looking for, the depth of experience, and they were competitive on pricing“ Sharon MacDonnell, Director of Sector Investment and Performance for the Emergency Management Group said.

Design considerations
From a technical perspective, the replacement solution needed to utilise out-of-the-box, configurable functionality and it needed to be a secure solution which could be integrated to other platforms in the future. As well as providing real-time analytics and insight for the operational team, the new system needed to be a user-friendly external facing portal for local councils. When the Mav3rik team designed the new system, their goal was to build a system to support the entire claims management process from receiving applications, assessment of claims right through to decisions and payments.

UX
Another significant design consideration was the user experience: creating an easy to use, intuitive and functional interface for local councils to submit and manage claims.

“We wanted the user-experience of the new system to be as friendly as possible”, said Sharon. “How councils navigated the system was a huge focus for us, as it was a departure from the legacy process where documentation was uploaded in word or excel format”. By incorporating modern UX principles into the design, the system supports councils to upload the correct documents the first time, whilst also enhancing data management and compliance.

Enhanced Data Storage
The new system allows the department to move away from word and excel formats, which enhances data visibility, security and reporting. Claim documents are now embedded in the system, improving reporting functionality for the department. Councils and the department’s
assessors can now see the status of claims in real time, making it easier to measure processing
times.

the solution

For the new system(that is in the final stages of development), Mav3rik’s incorporated Salesforce’s Public Sector Solutions (PSS), a suite of products designed to help public sector organisations better serve their constituents through purpose-built solutions. PSS combines purpose-built solutions with the power of Salesforce to produce a customisable off-the-shelf software-as-a-service cloud platform that enables secure, scalable, robust and compliant digital experiences for all users.

For the DJCS, PSS was an ideal choice due to its capacity to accelerate public sector processes, in particular the Emergency Response Management tool. The platform also leverages Experience Cloud for Delivery Agencies, including multiple forms delivered with Salesforce’s configuration-first digital experience toolkit,OmniStudio, as well as embedded workflows for managing disaster event grants and claims management. With these capabilities, the new system will work as a standalone solution as well as being scalable to meet future business demands.

RESULTS

For the DJCS, a dedicated industry-leading Claims Management System has become indispensable and will transform the efficiency of the department, as well as the councils who use it. The end-to-end solution will allow Delivery Agencies to notify the DJCS of disaster events, identify financial assistance required, and expedite the process of submitting, assessing and approving claims.

The platform will be rolled out to all councils in mid-2023, many of whom will use the new system to submit claims from the 2022 flood events. Following the roll out, the department will consider how the platform can be integrated with other systems, like financial platforms, crisis management portals and others, to support their goal of providing a seamless end-to-end claims management process.

“The Mav3rik team have been tremendous to work with. They’ve worked incredibly closely with our team, stepping us through the process with patience and very high levels of responsiveness. It really has been a collaboration and we’ve been delighted with their work,” Sharon said.