# Certificate of Insurance Prep Agent

Agent blueprint, validated with 8 team members · Task: Issue certificates of insurance · Commercial Lines Service · readiness 73/100 · Standardize first

Reads each emailed COI request, checks the policy's endorsements in Applied Epic, and proposes the holder type, additional insured, waiver and wording. After an account manager approves, it builds the ACORD 25 in Epic, drafts the reply to the holder and client, and closes the Epic activity once the person has sent it.

**Trigger:** A new certificate request arrives in the shared Outlook inbox (new email, flagged or classified as a COI request).

**Inputs:** Request email and attachments (contract or lease if included); Sender, holder name, holder address or project address from the email; Client account and policies in Applied Epic; Policy forms schedule and endorsements in Applied Epic (blanket additional insured, blanket waiver, primary and non-cont; Company's written certificate wording rules (not yet documented)

**Done when:** The certificate has been sent to both the holder and the client, and the activity is closed in Applied Epic.

## Steps

1. Detect new COI request and read the email and attachments (Outlook, connector)
2. Extract holder name, address, requested wording and contract requirements (Outlook, ai): Copy the holder details straight from the email instead of retyping them. Flag anything unclear or unusual.
3. Match the sender to the client account and policies (Applied Epic, api)
4. Read forms schedule for blanket additional insured and waiver endorsements (Applied Epic, api): Always done up front, which replaces the manual extra Epic visit seen in 29% of cases.
5. Propose holder type, additional insured, waiver and description of operations (Applied Epic, ai): Apply the team's rules. Only use wording the policy's endorsements support. Lenders get loss payee.
6. Send the proposed fields, evidence and draft reply to the account manager (Applied Epic, person): The account manager approves or edits the fields. No record is changed before this.
7. Create the Proof of Insurance entry and generate the ACORD 25 (Applied Epic, api): Runs only after approval. Whether the API exposes the certificate function needs confirming.
8. Create a draft reply to holder and client with the certificate attached (Outlook, connector): Saved as a draft only. It is not sent.
9. Review the certificate and draft, then send to holder and client (Outlook, person)
10. Log the request as an activity and close it in Epic (Applied Epic, api): Runs after the person has sent the email.

## Approvals

- Account manager approves the proposed holder type, additional insured, waiver and wording before anything is written to Applied Epic.
- Account manager reviews the generated certificate and sends the draft email personally. The agent never sends it.

## Prerequisites

- Write down the certificate rules (holder type, additional insured, waiver, standard description-of-operations wording). The readiness check says to standardize first, and no one named where the rules live.
- Service account for the agent with Applied Epic API access to accounts, policies, forms schedules, certificates and activities
- Confirmation that Epic's API can create the Proof of Insurance and generate the ACORD 25. If it can't, redesign this step.
- Outlook connector access to the shared inbox, with permission to create drafts
- Power Automate and Microsoft 365 Copilot licenses for the builder and the approvers
- A consistent way to identify the client account from the request email

## Risks

- A wrong endorsement check could put coverage on a certificate that the policy doesn't provide (errors and omissions exposure). Keep the approval step and show the endorsement evidence next to each field.
- Approvers may rubber-stamp proposals during Monday peaks. Sample approved certificates for quality.
- The team gave no standard wording, so AI-drafted descriptions of operations could drift. Use approved templates.
- Contracts attached in unusual formats may be misread. Send low-confidence extractions to a person.
- Paths vary widely today (60% follow the main path), so the agent's rules may miss local habits until they are documented.

## Measure after launch

- Median work time per certificate (baseline 6.4 minutes; 27.9 team hours per week across 224 cases)
- Share of certificates re-edited or reissued (baseline 15.6%)
- Share of cases needing a manual extra Epic lookup (baseline 28.6%)
- Certificate turnaround from request to send, especially on Mondays

## Decisions

| Decide | Rule | Source |
| --- | --- | --- |
| Holder type | Set to whoever is asking (general contractor, landlord, lender, or vendor/customer), based on the request email and the contract where available. | team |
| Additional insured | Yes only if the contract requires it and the policy carries the blanket additional insured endorsement. In practice Yes for general contractors and landlords, and for vendors/customers only when their contract says so. Never for lenders, who get loss payee. Data: Yes in 99% of general contractor cases, 96% of landlord cases, and No in 94% of lender cases. | team + data |
| Waiver of subrogation | Yes only when the contract asks for it and the policy has the blanket waiver endorsement. Check the forms schedule first. Mostly general contractor jobs, sometimes landlords, rarely lenders or vendors, and almost always No when additional insured is No. Data: Yes in 75% of general contractor cases, No in 100% of lender cases. | team + data |
| Special wording or endorsement requests beyond the standard | Not known yet: the team said 'use judgment' with no consistent rule. Route to a person. | unknown |
| Coverage the client doesn't have | Never show coverage the policy doesn't have. Tell the requester no. | team |
| Who receives the certificate | Send to both the holder and the client. | team |
| Rush handling and turnaround | Not known yet: ask the team. | unknown |
| When primary and non-contributory needs a carrier check | Not known yet: the team said it needs the endorsement and sometimes a carrier check, with no criteria. | unknown |

## Still to answer before building

- How does the agent check whether a policy can meet special wording or endorsements, and what happens when it can't?
- How are rush requests handled, and what turnaround is expected?
- When does primary and non-contributory wording require contacting the carrier?
- Where are the certificate rules written down, and who owns them?
- What rule applies in the roughly 25% of general contractor cases where waiver of subrogation is not Yes?
- Is holder type alone enough to grant additional insured, or must the contract also be checked? Answers differed. When do vendors/customers get it?
- What is the standard reply text and description-of-operations wording?
- Why is the holder name and address retyped in about a third of cases instead of copied?

## Exceptions

- When The client asks for coverage the policy doesn't have (described as the most common unusual request): Do not build the certificate with that coverage. Hand to the account manager with the missing endorsement noted and a draft 'no' to the requester. Coverage advice stays with licensed staff.
- When Extra endorsement check needed in Epic (about 29% of cases): The agent reads the forms schedule on every request, so this is no longer a manual detour.
- When Holder or wording changes after the first certificate, so it is reissued (about 16% of cases): Re-run the proposal from the new email, show what changed, and require approval again before reissuing.
- When Primary and non-contributory wording requested (occasional): If the endorsement is on the policy, propose it for approval. If it is absent or unclear, hand to a person, who may check with the carrier.
- When Special wording or endorsement requests from a contract or lease (no consistent rule): Hand to the account manager with the contract text and the matching or missing endorsements.
- When Rush request such as Friday afternoon for a Monday job (occasional): Flag as rush and put at the top of the account manager's queue. The handling rule is not defined yet.

## Build with

- Power Automate: Inbox trigger, Epic API calls, Outlook draft creation, approval routing, activity logging
- Microsoft 365 Copilot: Reads the request and contract, extracts holder details, and proposes fields and the draft reply
- Applied Epic: Source of policy and endorsement data, and where the certificate and activity are created
- Outlook: Request intake via connector, and a draft reply for a person to send

## Effort and return

- Size M, about 3-5 weeks (Power Automate, Copilot Studio prompt design, Applied Epic API, Insurance certificate knowledge (for testing))
- Team time on this task now: 28 h/week; expected back: 4-12 h/week

## Evidence

- too many different paths for an agent to follow reliably; the training guide comes first
- 60% of cases follow the same steps
- 28 team hours a week
- data is moved by hand from Microsoft Outlook to Applied Epic (33% retyped)
- 16% of cases redo steps
- 29% of cases need an extra lookup (an exception the agent must handle)