CIS/ ENGR 3281
Dr. D. G. Duncan
SYSTEMS ANALYSIS AND DESIGN Fall,
2006
SYSTEMS ANALYSIS AND DESIGN
HOMEWORK PROJECT SERIES
ON BIG WHEEL AUTO INSURANCE
COMPANY
After completing this project series, you should have a better
understanding of the information system. You should be able to apply the tools
and techniques of systems analysis and design with minimal supervision. You
should have better business and technical skills, and you should have better
programming and systems development skills. Homework will provide you the
opportunity to work with graphical software tools and to sharpen your desk top publishing
skills.
Assume you are a consultant to BWAIC and include a cover letter with
all 5 homework submissions. Do work that
you will be proud to show your boss someday.
PROJECT MILESTONES to be completed include:
1. Project proposal request
(homework assignment 1)
2. Profile of current system (homework assignment 1)
3. Information system development (homework assignment 1)
4. Data modeling (homework
assignment 2)
5. Process modeling
(homework assignment 2)
6. Database and user interface design (homework assignment 3)
7. Comprehensive project report
(homework assignment 4)
PHASE 1:
PROJECT REQUEST PROPOSAL - prepare a request for systems
services form for the Big Wheel Auto Insurance Company (BWAIC). Also submit any relevant documentation or
research material.
RELEVANT BACKGROUND:
Big Wheel Auto Insurance (BWAIC) is a small company that sells auto
insurance policies to licensed drivers in the state of
PHASE 1 continued:
PROFILE OF CURRENT SYSTEM-define the scope of the system in terms of goals, objectives, policies
and constraints, users, transactions, reports, decision support, and
alternative solutions.
SYSTEM PROFILE
PEOPLE: Affected people include
the agents, the customers, the Indiana
Dept. of Motor Vehicles, various local police departments, and various local
automobile body and repair shops.
DATA: BWAIC is interested in keeping track of policy holders who
purchase insurance policies from agents for their vehicles. Periodically, invoices are sent to the policy
holders requesting payment. At various
times policy holders may files claims against their policies which may require
several estimates.
ACTIVITIES: The activities that the system supports can be best
described by identifying the inputs (data) that are processed into outputs
(information). This system processes the
following inputs: policy application, policy payment, policy modification,
policy cancellation, claim, estimate, and a police accident report. Some of the outputs produced include an
automobile insurance policy, a policy cancellation confirmation, addendum
(modifications) to the policy, policy invoice, claim payment, policy card,
vehicle registration request, driving record request, and a policy rejection
notification.
Some of the reports to be produced include: Policy Master Listing,
Claim Master Listing, Invoice Master Listing, Policy Holder Master Listing,
Agent Master Listing, policies by Agent, Claims by Policy, Claims by Vehicle
Type, Invoices by Policy, Policies by Vehicle Type, Rejected Claims, Policy
Invoices Past Due, Rejected Policy Applications, Canceled Policies, and Claims
Without Estimates.
The system should also provide the following queries for decision
support purposes: Claims Against a Policy, Policy Query, Estimates for a Claim,
Invoices for a Policy, Policy Payments Query, Claim Payments Query, and Policy
Holder Query.
Several problems have also been identified. First, due to changes in state law and
federal regulations requiring minimum liability insurance, the number of policy
holders is expected to increase drastically in the next several years. There is a concern that the present system is
rapidly approaching its capacity. Next,
the amount of time to process customer claims against their policies has
increased to an unacceptable average of 90 days. Additionally, BWAIC would like to improve
their customer service by offering special discounts on their policies for good
driving records, non-smokers, students with good grades and senior
citizens. Also, some of the older
business processes for policy application and claims processing are inefficient
and need to be redesigned.
NETWORKS: BWAIC does business in four primary locations: the speedway
headquarters, the Corydon office, and the
TECHNOLOGY: Mr. Roberts has stipulated
that all of BWAIC's data, which is currently stored in various types of
computer files, be converted to a relational data base system.
INCORPORATE THE FOLLOWING ISSUES INTO YOUR DISCUSSION:
1. Briefly describe the problems and opportunities that triggered this
project.
2. Briefly describe the purpose the business application serves, and
list business goals and information system objectives to be directed toward
those goals.
3a. What are the business or system polices that must be conformed to
or which may constrain the information system solution? List them.
3b. Identify the system's user community and briefly describe their
roles or interest in the system. Include direct and indirect users.
4. List the capabilities and support the system will provide. Information system capabilities can be
categorized as inputs, outputs, and decision making opportunities.
5. You have already identified three building blocks of your
information system: people, activities,
and data. Also, all business systems use
networks, that is, the distribution structure of people, data, activities, and
technology to business location and the movement of those building blocks
between those locations. Remember each
floor, each office may be a different business location. Describe the business network.
6. Current technology already supports the other four building blocks
of the existing business system. You may
design new technology to support various aspects of the new information system
later in the project. What hardware and
software is being used to capture, store and manage data? What hardware and software is required to
support the information systems activities described earlier? What communications technology is used to
interconnect data and process technology at different business locations
described earlier?
PHASE 1 continued:
INFORMATION SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT - propose a systems development procedure for your project. Include
systems planning, systems analysis, systems design, systems implementation and
systems support. Present information using a letter of proposal, which includes
line items and rough cost estimates, a summary of the systems development
process, management concerns, and a Gantt chart.
HOMEWORK SET 1 DELIVERABLES:
PROJECT PROPOSAL REQUEST using systems services form; attach any
relevant research, documentation.
PROFILE OF CURRENT SYSTEM:
Summarize (1) what system BWAIC has currently and (2) what additional
needs the new system should meet. Include cost line items, the systems
development process and management concerns.
OUTLINE THE SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT PROCEDURE TO FOLLOW in development of
the new system. Try to prepare and
attach a simple GANTT chart.
COVER LETTER.
PHASE 2:
DATA MODELING - draw entity relationship diagrams to describe the data that the
system must store and the relationships that exist between the data. Use
graphics software. Also prepare a legend
in table format which includes the entity name, unique identifier and
description. Write a brief narrative to walk a non-computer person through your entity relationship
diagram.
Data items may include:
Agent name
Agent number
Agent office street address
Agent office city
Agent office state
Agent office zip code
Agent phone number
Application date
Application status
Car license place number
Car license plate state
Car license plate year
Car make
Car model
Car style
Car year
Claim amount
Claim date
Claim description
Claim number
Claim payment amount
Claim payment date
Claim payment date
Claim payment explanation
Claim rejection reason
Claim status
Claim type
Coverage amount
Coverage code
Coverage description
Date of accident
Date of policy cancellation
Description of accident
Driver street address
Driver city
Driver state
Driver zip code
Driver license no.
Driver name
Driver phone number
Estimate amount
Estimate company name
Estimate description
Invoice amount
Invoice amount due
Invoice date
Invoice date due
Invoice number
Invoice number
Payment amount
Payment date
Place of accident
Policy effective date
Policy cancellation date
Policy cancellation reason
Policy effective date
Policy expiration data
Policy holder street address
Policy holder city
Policy holder state
Policy holder zip code
Policy holder birth date
Policy holder drivers license number
Policy holder employer
Policy holder gender
Policy holder home phone number
Policy holder marital status
Policy holder name
Policy holder number
Policy holder occupation
Policy holder work phone number
Policy number
Policy officer badge number
Policy officer name
Policy rejected date
Policy rejected reason
Policy type
Reason for cancellation
Time of accident
Vehicle identification number
Vehicle type (make + model + style)
Weather conditions
HOMEWORK SET 2 DELIVERABLES:
DRAW ENTITY RELATIONSHIP DIAGRAMS to describe data the system must store
and the relationships between the data.
PREPARE A LEGEND in tabular format that describes the entity names,
unique identifiers and description.
PREPARE A NARRATIVE to walk a non-computer person through your ER
diagram.
COVER LETTER.
PHASE 3:
PROCESS MODELING - draw a decomposition diagram and a leveled set of logical data flow
diagrams to describe what processes must be performed on the data in the new
system in order to produce the desired information. Use graphics software. Also write a brief narrative to walk a
non-computer person through your data flow diagrams.
RELEVANT BACKGROUND:
BWAIC insurance system can initially be broken down into two
subsystems, policies and claims. Each of
these subsystems has four components:
transaction processing, management reporting and decision support, and
data maintenance. Policy transaction
processing can be further factored into four input transactions: an insurance
policy application, an insurance policy payment, a policy modification, and a
policy cancellation. Policy management
is divided into detail reports, summary reports, exception reports, and query
responses. Four detail reports are:
policy master listing, invoice master listing, policy holder master listing and
agent master listing. Three summary
reports include: policies by agent, invoices by policy, and policies by vehicle
type. Three exception reports include:
policy invoices past due, rejected policy applications, and canceled policies. Four query responses include policy query,
invoices for a policy, policy payments query, and policy holder query. Claim transaction processing consists of only
one primary input transaction: a
policyholder claim. (The estimate and the police accident report are both
secondary input transactions necessary to complete the processing of a
claim.) Claim management reporting is
not divided into separate detail reports, summary reports, exception reports,
and query responses due to an insufficient number of reports. Claim reports and queries include: claim
master listing, claims by policy, claims by vehicle type, rejected claims,
claims without estimates, claims against a policy query, estimates for a claim
query, and claim payments query.
For a policy application, the application is recorded and stored. Then a vehicle registration request is sent
to the department of motor vehicles to confirm that the applying policy holder
is the owner of the vehicle. When the
vehicle registration arrives, the registered owner is compared to the
policyholder. If they do not match, a
policy application rejection notice is sent to the applicant and the
application status is changed to reflect the policy rejection. If the owner is confirmed, a driving record
request is sent to the local police department to obtain information about
arrests, citations, accidents, etc. When
the driving record is received, it is evaluated against a set of company
standards and classified as either acceptable or unacceptable. If the driving record is unacceptable, a
policy application rejection is prepared as described above. If the driving record is acceptable, a policy
is issued and sent to the policy holder, and various policy holder, vehicle,
policy and agent data is updated.
Periodically, all active policies are processed in order to generate
policy invoices to be sent to the policy holders.
For a policy modification, the policy and policy holder are first
verified. A refund or balance due is
calculated and either a refund or an invoice is sent to the policyholder and
the policy is modified.
For a policy cancellation, the processing is exactly the same as
described above except the policy is canceled (instead of modified), the
vehicle and any claims, estimates, or invoices are deleted, the agent modified,
and a refund is calculated and sent to the policyholder.
For a claim, the claim is recorded and stored. Next, the matching policy is found and a
determination is made as to whether the claim is covered by the provision
(coverages) of the policy. If the claim
is not covered, the claim is rejected, the claim status modified and the
policyholder notified of the claim rejection.
If the claim is covered, the claim is checked for a minimum of two
accompanying estimates. If the estimates
are missing, a pending status is recorded for the claim and the policyholder is
notified to obtain the necessary estimates.
If the estimates are included, the claim type is determined. If the claim involves a collision with
another vehicle, a police accident report request is sent to the police
department, and the status of the claim is modified. When the accident report
is received it is determined whether the
policyholder was at fault (or charged) for the accident. If the policyholder was not charged or the
accident did not involve a collision, a claim payment is generated and sent to
the policyholder, and the claim is updated.
If the policyholder was charged, a claim payment is still made as
described above, but also the policy is updated to reflect an increased rate
for the next invoice.
HOMEWORK SET 3 DELIVERABLES:
DECOMPOSITION DIAGRAM.
LEVELED SET (first level) OF LOGICAL DATA FLOW DIAGRAMS.
NARRATIVE -to walk a non-computer person through DFDs.
COVER LETTER.
PHASE 3:
DATA BASE DESIGN
DATA BASE DESIGN:
Previously it was specified that a relational database management
system be used.
Draw a logical schema depicting the database’s structure. The logical relationships between logical
records should be clearly shown on the schema. Document the content and
internal structure of logical records in the database using data definition
language and record layout charts.
Include sample attributes and normalized entities.
Comment on how you would proceed to design user interfaces such as an
input screen and
output report.
HOMEWORK SET 3 DELIVERABLES:
DATABASE SCHEMA.
USER INTERFACE SCREEN FOR INPUT
USER INTERFACE SCREEN FOR OUTPUT
DATA DEFINITION LANGUAGE WITH SAMPLE ATTRIBUTES,
ENTITIES.
NARRATIVE
describing user interfaces and output report.
COVER LETTER.
PHASE 4:
COMPILE COMPREHENSIVE PROJECT REPORT
Prepare a portfolio of your big wheel insurance case project to show to a prospective employer. Develop a comprehensive technical report that packages homework assignments one through five. You are encouraged to fix errors and improve upon what you originally submitted. Include a cover letter to your client, an executive summary, table of contents, and, optionally, a copy of the homework assignment in the appendix. Number the pages and bind in a folder with a transparent plastic cover. (The handout can be downloaded from Blackboard or from Prof. Duncan’s web site.)
HOMEWORK SET 4 DELIVERABLES:
Project report comprised of:
COVER LETTER
TABLE OF CONTENTS
EXECUTIVE SUMMARY
PROJECT PROPOSAL REQUEST
PROFILE OF CURRENT SYSTEM
INFORMATION SYSTEMS DEVELOPMENT OVERVIEW
DATA MODELING
PROCESS MODELING
DATABASE AND INTERFACE DESIGN
APPENDIX:
-COPY OF HOMEWORK HANDOUT
-REFERENCE MATERIALS
-ANY OTHER RELEVANT MATERIALS
3281proj_revised_fall_2006