Ceres Group Joins ChannelPoint Commerce Internet Exchange for Insurance; Web-Based Plan Information Establishes Internet-Based Distribution Channel.COLORADO SPRINGS Colorado Springs, city (1990 pop. 281,140), seat of El Paso co., central Colo., on Monument and Fountain creeks, at the foot of Pikes Peak; inc. 1886. It is a year-round resort and a booming military, technological, and commercial city. , Colo.--(BW HealthWire)--July 14, 1999-- ChannelPoint, Inc., the world's only Internet exchange See IXP and NAP. provider for insurance, today announced that Ceres Group Inc., a leading provider of healthcare and life insurance, has joined the ChannelPoint Commerce Internet exchange for insurance. The agreement enables Ceres to expand its current distribution channels by making health plan information, options, products and services available via the Internet Internet Publicly accessible computer network connecting many smaller networks from around the world. It grew out of a U.S. Defense Department program called ARPANET (Advanced Research Projects Agency Network), established in 1969 with connections between computers at the to thousands of insurance brokers selling and servicing Ceres' products. Ceres plan information will be available through the free ChannelPoint Commerce Broker(TM) electronic marketplace located at www.commercebroker.com. "The Internet is rapidly emerging as the best tool for insurance brokers who wish to increase their customer focus by providing more choices and faster processing," said Peter W. Nauert, Chairman of Ceres Group. "The ChannelPoint Commerce Internet exchange for insurance enables Ceres to make our products available to a wider group of sales agents and to broaden the types of products available to these agents. It also will help speed up the sales process A sales process is a systematic approach for performing product or service sales. The reasons for having a sales process include seller and buyer risk management, achieving standardized customer interaction in sales and scalable revenue generation. with instant access to information on competing products." "The ChannelPoint Commerce Internet exchange enables brokers to fully address the demands of today's small to mid-sized businesses by offering the most flexible, comprehensive and tailored insurance solutions possible," said Jeff Bork, senior vice president of worldwide marketing for ChannelPoint. "With ChannelPoint Commerce, Ceres insurance professionals will spend less time on paperwork and more time building their businesses." Initially, Ceres Group will provide information on its Partnership product, an employer partially self-funded health insurance plan of Ceres subsidiary, Central Reserve Life Insurance Company (CRL CRL - Carnegie Representation Language. Carnegie Group, Inc. Frame language derived from SRL. Written in Common LISP. Used in the product Knowledge Craft. ). The target date for implementation is September September: see month. 1999. Brokers will access the CRL product data as well as information on products of other insurance companies which are part of the ChannelPoint Exchange. Currently, there are 19 carriers committed to participate with nearly 3,000 plans available through the exchange to date. With the tools and information available at the ChannelPoint Internet Exchange, brokers will be able to electronically compare benefits and premium costs among numerous insurance companies. Brokers can specify benefit configurations, with co-payment co-payment Managed Care That portion of a claim or medical expense that a health plan member must pay out-of-pocket for specific medical services–eg, hospital care, drugs, office visits, etc; the insurer pays the remaining portion levels, deductibles and other factors, then run comparisons among companies and download To receive a file transmitted over a network. In any communications session, "download" means receive, and "upload" means send. The download/upload often implies a big/little scenario, in which data is being downloaded from the "big" server into the "little" user's computer. a completely formatted proposal. ChannelPoint Commerce is the first and only business-to-business Internet exchange exclusively focused on insurance and benefits distribution. It enables carriers, brokers and financial institutions to establish electronic marketplaces ("e-markets") for marketing, selling, shopping and buying insurance products on the web. ChannelPoint Commerce Broker is an advanced e-market enabled by the ChannelPoint Commerce exchange and designed specifically for brokers and agents to sell insurance and benefits products on the web. Unlike simple, online referral services and product catalogs, ChannelPoint Commerce Broker is a total solution for consolidating carrier product and pricing information, managing associated business rules and providing a comprehensive insurance distribution environment on the Internet. About Ceres Group Ceres Group, Inc. is a healthcare company focusing on acquiring and consolidating indemnity Recompense for loss, damage, or injuries; restitution or reimbursement. An indemnity contract arises when one individual takes on the obligation to pay for any loss or damage that has been or might be incurred by another individual. health insurance blocks of business, reducing costs and strengthening product lines and profitability. Ceres Group subsidiaries actively distribute healthcare and life insurance products on a national basis through 50,000 sales agents. Products are marketed to individuals and small to mid-sized businesses and Americans age 55 and older. For more information visit www.ceresgroupinc.com. About ChannelPoint, Inc. ChannelPoint is the global leader in reinventing how businesses buy, sell and service insurance and benefits products via the Internet. Leading insurance companies, brokerages and financial institutions use ChannelPoint's "straight-through processing straight-through processing The direct exchange of cash and securities. Straight-through processing is a major objective for cross-border transactions that are generally much more costly to settle compared to domestic transactions. " solutions to maximize sales and efficiency by streamlining their entire distribution cycle. The ChannelPoint Commerce Internet exchange enables complete web-based marketing, buying and selling for businesses and consumers. The ChannelPoint Insure Insure can mean:
1. The process by which investment bankers raise investment capital from investors on behalf of corporations and governments that are issuing securities (both equity and debt). 2. The process of issuing insurance policies. and renewals. ChannelPoint is headquartered in Colorado Springs, Colo. For more information, visit http://www.channelpoint.com. This release contains forward-looking statements forward-looking statement A projected financial statement based on management expectations. A forward-looking statement involves risks with regard to the accuracy of assumptions underlying the projections. which may involve known and unknown risks, uncertainties and other factors that may cause actual results and performance to be materially different from any future results or performance suggested by these statements. Note to editors: ChannelPoint, ChannelPoint Commerce and ChannelPoint Insure are trademarks of ChannelPoint, Inc. All other product and company names mentioned herein are the property of their respective owners and are mentioned for identification purposes only. |
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