As insurance professionals face growing administrative demands, AI is emerging as a practical way to reduce repetitive work while improving the speed and quality of benefits management. Vertafore is applying this approach to one of the most time-consuming stages of the benefits workflow: creating and maintaining benefit plans. In an exclusive conversation with AI Reporter America, August Butterbrodt, VP, Product Management at Vertafore, discussed how the company’s Velocity AI Benefit Plan Agent is helping brokers automate plan data extraction and setup directly within BenefitPoint, delivering a reported 70% reduction in plan setup time while keeping professionals in control through human review and approval.

1. What inspired the launch of the Velocity AI Benefit Plan Agent?

At Vertafore, we are always looking at where technology can be used to remove friction from the everyday work of insurance professionals. In this instance, the Velocity AI Benefit Plan Agent was created to address one of the most time-consuming and error-prone workflows in benefits management: creating and maintaining benefit plans. Before plans even become ready for servicing, brokers spend valuable time reviewing carrier plan documents, manually entering information and validating data. We saw an opportunity here to apply AI to the process, so agencies can spend less time on administrative work and more time serving clients.

2. How does the AI agent simplify benefit plan setup while maintaining accuracy?

The Benefit Plan Agent is designed to automate repetitive work while keeping benefits professionals in control. Users upload a supported document plan, the AI agent extracts and structures plan information, and then the broker reviews, makes edits if needed, and approves the data before it becomes finalized in BenefitPoint. If they need to double check information the AI agent has extracted, they can view the source document in the same window and see where the extracted field came from. This human-in the loop approach helps reduce manual data entry while maintaining broker oversight, resulting in a 70% reduction in plan setup time with 90% accuracy.

3. What sets the Velocity AI Benefit Plan Agent apart from traditional benefits administration tools?

A large part of the value the Benefit Plan Agent brings is not simply what it can do, but where it does it. The AI agent is native to BenefitPoint – where brokers already work – rather than functioning as a standalone tool that introduces additional complex integration requirements. In addition to this, BenefitPoint is trusted by 10 of the top 15 benefits brokerages and supports more than 4 million employee benefit plans, so embedding AI directly into the platform brokers already use makes a meaningful impact across the insurance industry. Instead of simply extracting information, the AI agent prepares structured, system-ready data for benefits professionals to help eliminate the need to re-enter data.

4. How does embedding AI within BenefitPoint improve broker productivity and client service?

Embedding the Benefit Plan Agent directly inside BenefitPoint allows brokers to move from plan documents to plan data without switching between systems or relying on re-entering information. That creates a more seamless workflow, resulting in less time spent on administrative work and greater confidence in the accuracy of plan data. And because plan creation happens directly inside BenefitPoint, agencies also strengthen the quality of the data that powers reporting and client service. The value of that efficiency becomes particularly clear during benefits season, when agencies feel the weight of every manual process. Teams are processing large volumes of plan changes under tight deadlines, making speed and accuracy crucial. By helping brokers onboard plans faster and reduce reliance on manual data entry, the Benefit Plan Agent addresses burdens during one of the busiest times of the year.

5. Where do you see AI creating the biggest impact in employee benefits administration?

The biggest opportunity for AI is creating more capacity for benefits professionals to focus on serving their clients and delivering value where their expertise matters most. Repetitive, manual tasks can slow agencies down and introduce opportunities for error, and benefit plan setup is a great example of this issue. It requires reviewing documents, extracting information and data entry before client-facing work can begin. By handling much of that administrative effort while keeping users in control of the final review, AI can help agencies drive greater consistency, improve data quality and create better business outcomes.

And the value can compound. By having a stronger and more accurate data entry strategy, brokers will have deeper and more reliable insights into their benefits business. With less time entering data, they can focus even more on the client experience and leverage their data for benchmarking, insights and improved decision making.

6. What challenges do benefits teams face when adopting AI-driven workflows?

Successful AI adoption requires more than simply adding more AI technology. Benefits professionals must determine where it can create meaningful value in their business, identify proper use cases, integrate AI into existing workflows and then build confidence that the outputs are reliable. For adoption to stick, AI must fit naturally within the systems and processes brokers already rely on and enhance team expertise rather than creating more complexities.

That’s the approach behind the Vertafore Velocity AI Platform. Instead of delivering standalone, disconnected tools, we're embedding purpose-built AI agents directly into the insurance workflows and platforms our customers use every day. The Benefit Plan Agent reflects this philosophy by automating one of the most repetitive parts of plan setup while keeping benefits professionals in control through human review – all in a product they already use.