Clarity Systems, has reported that LV=, one of the UK’s oldest mutual financial services groups is using Clarity FSR to prepare all of its 2008 annual accounts for March 2009 filing. Clarity FSR manages the production of Financial Statements through the so called “Last Mile” of finance. Liverpool Victoria Group, employs more than 3,700 people, serves around 3.5 million customers and members, and manages around £7 billion on their behalf.
"At LV= we are always looking for operational and technical advantages to improve our cost-efficiency for the benefit of our policyholders," says Andy Young, Group Financial Controller. "So when we found the one product on the market that could automate our manual, MS Excel-based annual account preparation and filing process, we were keen to adopt it. With Clarity FSR, we've gained greater control over the reporting process, with the specific benefit of the consolidation of numerous spreadsheets into a single Clarity FSR document, complete with version control, workflow and audit trail capabilities."
More than 50 companies provide death/life benefits, critical illness, income protection, house, car and travel insurance and other services to just over one million members under the LV= umbrella. The individual companies or group accounts used to provide all the numbers in myriad MS Word and MS Excel documents, which Young and his team had to check and combine to produce monthly reports and the annual accounts. The process had become far too cumbersome, costly and risk-prone.
"Using Clarity FSR, our people are finding more time to review and confirm the numbers, and add incisive commentary, in our annual accounts and management reports," says Young, who adds that "FSR is a key component of our move from a financial environment that emphasises production, to one that is about adding value."
Mark Nashman, President and CTO, Clarity Systems commented "Whether one is filing with the UK's Financial Services Authority or with the U.S. Securities and Exchange Commission, Clarity FSR is the only enterprise software application that automates the external reporting process by providing a robust set of functionality to improve the efficiency and reduce the risk inherent in the production of statutory and regulatory reports.”
Young also noted that, while there are no current requirements for UK-based insurers to tag their accounts in XBRL format, some regulators are looking at XBRL as an optional filing method so "We appreciate that Clarity has already integrated XBRL into the external reporting process by making the tagging, creation and validation of XBRL documents seamless with FSR, which will stand us in good stead in the future," said Young.
