Quote purging

Over time, the PolicyCenter database accumulates quotes from policy transactions (jobs) not resulting in bound policies and alternate policy periods created through multi-version quoting and side-by-side quoting. As time passes, these policy transactions and policy periods have little business value, increase database storage requirements, and slow response time. Quote purging removes these policy transactions and policy periods from the database.

Note: In PolicyCenter, the user interface uses the term policy transaction to refer to submissions, policy changes, and other policy transactions. Policy transactions are implemented as jobs in the data model, and referred to as jobs in PCF files, Gosu classes, and other configuration files. Therefore, the configuration documentation refers to policy transactions as jobs.

Quote purging also removes orphaned policy periods. Orphaned policy periods are not associated with a policy transaction. Preempted policy transactions result in orphaned policy periods.

Quote purging provides batch processes to remove from the database these policy transactions, policy periods, and associated objects. Quote purging is not an end user feature. Quote purging is disabled in the base configuration.

Quote purging overview

Quote purging removes unnecessary policy transactions and policy periods from the PolicyCenter database. You purge quotes by running batch processes.

Quote purging removes policy transactions and other entities from the database. Quote purging is not a reversible operation.

In the default configuration, quote purging provides the following functionality:

Purge stale submissions and policy changes – Purge unbound submissions and policy changes after a specified length of time has passed.
Prune unselected versions in a side-by-side quote or multi-version quote – Pruning removes unselected policy periods from submissions and policy changes. Jobs have one selected policy period. In the default configuration, policy transactions can acquire multiple unselected policy periods through side-by-side quoting and multi-version quoting.
Purge preempted policy periods – Preempted policy transactions create orphaned policy periods, which are policy periods not associated with a policy transaction. Preempted policy transactions result in orphaned policy periods. Quote purging provides a batch process that removes from the database these orphaned policy periods on submissions and policy changes.
Do not purge policies excluded from purging – Do not purge policy periods on policies flagged as DoNotDestroy.

Quote purging does not purge policy transactions with archived policy periods. Quote purging does not prune archived policy periods.

Guidewire does not support configuring quote purging to remove archived policy periods.

Quote purging configuration business cases

Quote purging is configurable. Through configuration, some of the types of changes you can make to quote purging are:

Change number of days that must pass before purging policy transactions – Configuration parameters specify the number of days after which a policy transaction is considered for purging. You can change the purge date to affect future runs of the purging batch process.
Vary purge date based on business rules – For example, purge rejected submissions including notes and reasons for the rejection after two years, not the usual six months. If the customer applies for insurance again at a later time, the agent can use the information in the rejected submission in deciding whether to issue a policy. Rejected submissions are identified by rejected underwriting issues.
In addition, the company retains quotes provided by their customer service representatives over the phone for six months, but retains quotes that originate on the website for only four months.
Purge other policy transaction types – In the default configuration, submissions and policy changes are considered for purging. You can add or remove policy transaction types.
Purge policy transactions based on business rules – For example, an insurance company receives inquiries from desirable prospective customers. When an agent enters a submission for a desirable prospect, the agent marks the submission so that the submission will not be purged.
Prune versions based on business rules – For example, an insurance company wishes to retain all versions of side-by-side quotes on policy transactions only for existing customers. Other side-by-side quotes are pruned.
Collect summary information before purging – The management team at an insurance company monitors team performance by counting submissions, submissions converted to bound policies, and policy values. The team configures quote purging to retain data from purged policies that is necessary for generating performance metrics.

Note: The Personal Data Destruction feature provides a more complete set of functionality to help insurers comply with their data destruction requirements.

These requirements may be driven by insurers’ policies and practices. For example, an insurance company takes in a large number of business inquiries. Each new inquiry has an associated account. On a regular basis, the company wants to purge the account-related information which clutters the database and slows searches.

These requirements may also be driven by the insurance company’s interpretation of various regulatory requirements, such as the European Union General Data Protection Regulation (GDPR) or the New York State Cybersecurity Requirements for Financial Services Companies law.

For more information, see Personal data destruction.

Quote purging: what gets purged or pruned?

Purging and pruning remove the policy period and all effective dated objects in the policy period branch. Purging and pruning also remove objects directly related to the policy period such as notes, documents, activities, and forms. Purging and pruning does not remove objects not directly related to the policy period.

Because form text data can be shared between policy periods, quote purging does not remove form text data. As a result, form text data can be orphaned as a result of quote purging.

In addition to removing policy periods, purging also removes the policy transaction. For example, if purging removes all policy transactions associated with a policy, it also removes the Policy object when a Policy only exists because of an unbound submission.

Pruning only removes policy periods associated with alternate versions; pruning does not remove the policy transaction.

Purging and pruning also remove objects related to underwriting issues on the policy period. In the default configuration, human-touched underwriting issues are not purged or pruned.