3 minute read
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Microfiche jacket system for insurance records
Trinity Insurance of Gloucester is using a microfiche jacket system as an archival record and retrieval system for all its insurance files. The system uses planetary cameras and a Photomatrix 410 Microfiche Duplicator. Manager of the Microfilm Department, Neil Dunning, who is an O & M specialist, inherited a paper filing system set up when he took over the unit in 1978. The paper files were spread throughout regional offices, the head office and a warehouse. Neil Dunning estimates that the equivalent volume today would occupy 9,000 square feet of precious office space if a microfiche system had not been installed. Instead, just 450 square feet of space is used both for the filmed records and the production area, with four staff for filming, filing and copying. Its files consist of policy wordings, endorsements, general correspondence and separate claims files. When a member of staff is working on a particular case, any new records remain in paper form, but a£ soon as the file is closed, the records are microfilmed and the paper destroyed. The files are filmed with planetary cameras and a rotary camera onto rolls of microfilm which are then cut up and inserted into fiche jackets in chronological order, in a 5 x 12 format, with one or more jackets per policy or claim as required. As and when required by end users, these are periodically rearranged into sections on endorsements, general correspondence etc., but the past records are never destroyed. Instead, the original film is merely ‘crossed out’ so that the fiche give a total historical record for audit and legal purposes. The jackets themselves are edge notched and colour coded into different categories to make filing and retrieval easier and then stored in master cabinets in the microfilm department. These masters never leave the section. So the key to the use of the system is the ability to duplicate the masters, both for an off-site back up and for Trinity’s staff who wish to access the records. Each newly created microfiche is duplicated twice, with one copy to the originating office and the other going to the technical section. This is done using a Photomatrix 410 Duplicator, which gives a fast turnround. The unit under Neil Dunning guarantees that any files submitted to his department by 10 am will be duplicated and dispatched (by Securicor) by 4 pm so as to ensure a 24-hour service. When the system was first installed, the chosen duplicator copied from the fiche jackets onto cut sheet and used an anhydrous ammonia reproduction method. As volumes grew, this became expensive in its use of cut sheets and there was concern for the safety of the ammonia gas. So, two years ago, a Photomatrix Model 410 Microfiche Duplicator was installed. This is a low to medium volume fiche copier which produces cut diazo duplicates from microfiche masters using roll diazo. It is marketed by Photomatrix Ltd. throughout Europe. The Model 410 Duplicator uses aqueous ammonia and not only copes comfortably with Trinity’s current volume of 2000 duplicates a week, but has reduced material costs and halved the staffing from two to one operator. The resultant savings produced a payback period of less than three years for the capital cost. The microfilm section at Trinity Insurance now has 370,000 insurance cases on fiche and has not lost a single record since 1978, whilst giving a fast turnround of duplicates to its staff, thanks to a well organised department with an efficient diazo duplicator. Contact: Photomatrix Ltd., The Forum, High Street, Edgware, Middlesex HA8 7HB. Tel: 01-951 1604. Telex: 8956371. Fax: 01-951 4284.
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