Business Units

You can group producers into logical or physical segmentations or divisions for easier tracking, maintenance, and reporting. In Producer Manager, these groupings are called "business units."

Use the Business Units data section of a producer record to review a producer's assignment to one or multiple business divisions, segments, distribution channels, or geographic locations in your organization.

A business unit may also contain more granular divisions, or sub-codes.

ClosedView screen capture

To review a producer's Business Units, click the Business Units link in the Quick Links box of a producer record that is open in the Review/Update Producer page.

The Business Units data section includes the following fields and controls:

  • BU Name: For each business unit listed, displays its name.

  • Status: For each business unit listed, displays its status, either Active or Inactive.

  • Business Segment: Optional. For each business unit listed, displays the business unit's selected business segment sub-code.

  • Distribution Channel: Optional. For each business unit listed, displays the business unit's selected distribution channel sub-code.

  • Servicing Location: Optional. For each business unit listed, displays the business unit's selected servicing location sub-code.

  • Begin Date: For each business unit listed, displays the date on which its status most recently became Active.

  • End Date: For each business unit listed, displays the date on which its status most recently became Inactive.

  • Cost Center: For each business unit listed, displays its associated cost center.

  • Add/Update Business Unit: Click to open the Maintain Producer Business Unit page, where you can manually maintain a producer's business unit information.

Notes

Note: The values displaying in the BU Name field are the values of the Short Name field for business units as configured on the Maintain Business Unit page. Do not confuse them with the values of the BU Name field on the same page.

Note: Based on your company's business rules, the system may be Vertafore-configured to require that an individual or firm producer be assigned to at least one business unit. For more information, see Configuration Options.

Tips

If you are adding a batch of producer records to Producer Manager using Quick Load Producers, you can assign each new producer to one business unit as a part of the process. When Producer Manager creates the new producer record, the business unit already will be recorded on the record, saving manual data entry.

You can add business unit information to producer records in batches, using the Bulk Business Data Updates capability in Producer Express. The value of the Name field (i.e., Business Unit Short Name) is used in the Bulk Business Data Updates process to add business unit information to each producer in a batch. For more information about Bulk Business Data Updates, contact your Vertafore representative. Also, see Printable Help Guides.

A producer can be assigned to a business unit automatically based on information obtained from Producer Express during the processing of an onboarding or maintenance transaction request. For more information about this capability or about Producer Express, contact your Vertafore representative.

If your company is using the Auto-Appoint feature, the system automatically can submit a state appointment request for a producer belonging to one or more specific business units, anytime an automated data reconciliation finds that the producer holds a new state license or line of authority (qualification). For more information, see Add Appointments and Configuration Options.

You may assign a group of producers to a specific business unit as a way to track their business relationships. Depending on your business objectives, you may also use Firm Associations, Agreements, External System IDs, and Locations and Departments to logically group and record business connections among individual and firm producers.