FAQs

Inhance is a new toolkit providing (re)insurers with various ways to profile, analyse, and enhance their property exposure data, helping them better understand the quality and adequacy of their data. It combines a number of analysis tools (maps, charts, tables) with a unique Data Market that provides external exposure and hazard datasets for cross-validation and augmentation of property attributes.

The costs for accessing hazard and comparison data in Inhance depend on two factors: the volume of data that you wish to cross-check, and the type of hazard or exposure comparison data. Inhance offers economies of scale in the pricing of data with discounts in the Pro and Premium plans. Therefore, so the more records you check against datasets, the greater the saving potential.

A few example scenarios have been developed to help you out:

1. A Basic user loads an account of 5,000 risks. 1,000 these are in wind-prone areas, so he checks these against the US Wind Hazard Pack (7 return periods) to rank his risks by peril intensity at a total cost of £115. He then uses Inhance's Profiling tools to isolate 500 risks to cross-validate against exposure comparison data at a further cost of £255*. Total cost: £370.
2. A Pro user loads an account of 100,000 risks. She checks all of these against the US Earthquake Hazard Pack (2 return periods, 7 deterministic events) at a cost of £2,180. She uses the Profiling tools to isolate 10,000 risks to cross-validate against exposure comparison data (£3,100)*. Total cost: £5,280.
3. A Premium user loads 50 accounts with 10,000 risks in each. He checks all of these locations against US Earthquake, Geological, Wind, Tsunami, Flood and Wildfire packs (at no cost as these are included in his annual license). He then wishes to cross-check a total of 50,000 exposures against exposure comparison data, costing in the range of £10K-£32.5K, depending on provider.

*in each of these cases, when the user has purchased the exposure comparison data he can freely update/augment as many fields that are necessary for the risks he has cross-checked.

Inhance is not a cat model, but sits alongside the models to allow deeper understanding and improvement of property exposure data. This can either be prior to the data entering the model or by analysing exposure data already in your database. Of course, validating and improving your exposure data before it enters the models will reduce the uncertainty in your modelled outputs.

No. Inhance is a separate exposure data analytics tool. It is designed to be interoperable with the next generation of cat model platforms. Discussions are underway with providers to develop direct links to these platforms.

Inhance provides a seamless suite of Profiling tools for analysing exposures. Maps, charts, plots and tables all interact to provide a number of "lenses" with which to inspect your data. Heuristic checks automatically apply engineering rules to your data, and users can generate their own checks based on company reporting or regulatory policies. Individual or groups of exposures can be isolated for cross-validation with comparison data.

Three plans are available for Inhance.

Basic
Allows free access to the analytics tools for individuals, with pay-per-record use of the hazard and comparison datasets.

Pro
Provides a larger data limit and company-wide usage for a monthly fee of £999 (Excl. VAT).

Premium
An annually licensed version of Inhance, priced according to individual requirements.

You can start instantly with our Basic and Pro plans. For Basic, just load a dataset and you can access the profiling tools and Inhance Data Market. All hazard data and exposure comparison data are charged on a pay-per-use basis, so simply load up some tokens and access hundreds of datasets at the click of a button. For Pro, you will have 30-days free access before a registered credit card is charged a monthly fee. Click for a detailed comparison of plans

There are a wide range of potential benefits from using Inhance:

• Increased certainty - A combination of Profiling tools and Data Market allows for identification and improvement of inadequate or missing data. This results in an increased certainty of your exposure data.
• Improve Modelled outputs - Improved exposure data means less uncertainty in modelled outputs.
• Independent validation - Exposure comparison data provided by the Data Market means improved risk selection and an improved technical price at time of underwriting
• Compliance - Demonstrate a greater understanding of your exposures and uncertainty for regulators and compliance officers.
• Efficiency - Automate analysis workflows using Heuristic checks to speed up identification of suspicious and inadequate data. Retain and share analysts’ findings.
• Cost-effectiveness - Access external hazard and exposure comparison data by a unique transactional-based pricing system - only pay for the data you need.
• Communicate data issues - Inhance's reporting engine allows instantaneous communication of data quality issues across your team or company.

Inhance allows data analysts to work more confidently and effectively by harnessing additional data resources and analytics to clean and improve datasets. In addition, users can access to tools to visually present exposure with graphs and maps for a more robust view of risk. Inhance allows analysts to demonstrate to Solvency II auditors that there is an established, transparent data cleaning protocol, and that data quality is an important component in risk allocation. All features retain a full audit trail so that it is possible to see the modifications made and the source of the data enhancement.

Inhance can support very large volumes of exposure data. However, to ensure performance for users of the Basic and Pro plans we have to set a data limit. For Basic, you can load 25 accounts, each with up to 5,000 records. Pro supports 50 accounts, each with up to 100,000 records. Talk to us about our Premium model where there are no data limits. Call +44 (0)1483 400683 for more information.

Yes. Geocoding is the process of associating address information with latitude/longitude coordinates. It is an essential process for representing data on a map or for running cat models. You can currently add geocode information or improve the precision (e.g. from state centroid to rooftop level geocode) using Inhance's comparison data. We are finalising our geocoding engine right now, which will be available soon.

Yes. Inhance is a web-based product that can be accessed from any supported internet browser. However, your username and password can only be used to access the system from one computer at a time.

Inhance will run on any standards-compliant web browser. These include Chrome, Firefox, Safari and modern versions (9+) of Internet Explorer.

IE8 only runs on Windows XP, a 12-year old operating system for which Microsoft is ending support on 08 April 2014 (http://www.microsoft.com/en-us/windows/enterprise/end-of-support.aspx). In this context, the amount of extra development required to get a modern web application to run on 12-year old browser technology would significantly impact our ability to innovate. In addition, the end of security patches for Windows XP will make that platform a significant security risk.

Absolutely. However, if your PC and/or network runs XP, then you will need to install Chrome or Firefox.

Yes. Inhance is a software-as-a-service (SaaS) platform, meaning you will receive automatic updates seamlessly. Notifications will inform users of the larger upgrades and/or new features when they are available.

Multiple users are available on Pro and Premium plans. You can add up to 100 users, but will have to adhere to a data limit on Pro Your company administrator will be able to add additional users - just check your Settings page to find out who that is.

Depending on your subscription, there are a number of levels of support available to you. For users on the Basic plan, the website will be the main portal for support, and we will be constantly adding new resources. For those on Pro, support is available by email. Premium users also benefit from access to a manned telephone line for support, hints and tips.

For Basic and Pro versions, simply load your data from csv files into Inhance. For customers on a Premium plan, we can talk about integration options that suit your organisation.

Inhance supports common market-wide source formats, including:

• ACORD
• EDM extract (as provided by users, not the proprietary source RMS formats)
• UNICEDE Users have the ability to define the output formats for the augmentations from comparison datasets.

The beauty of Inhance is it can be used in numerous different ways and is quite intuitive to use. However, if you want to ensure you’re getting the most from Inhance, we can organise on-site workshops we can hold for your organisation . In addition our Premium plan includes some training sessions to get you off and running. Please contact us for more information on bespoke workshops we can hold for your organisation.

Heuristic checks are a series of database queries that are used to “trap” suspicious, unlikely data, e.g. A wood frame building with 20 floors.

Heuristics rules are a set of queries that examine the referential integrity of various attributes in a row of data. These include location, occupancy, structure type, and year built. The records that are unlikely are returned back to the user for profiling, analysis, and comparison.

Some examples of heuristics are quite obvious. For example, buildings over 100 stories in the US are rarely found outside large cities, wood frame buildings can only be so tall, and single family dwellings are only so large. Others take engineering expertise combined with database analysis and photogrammetric techniques, to determine the likely structural and occupancy combinations and how these vary by geography. For example, light frame and heavy wood frame construction is very rare in the United States, and tilt-up construction is rare before 1960.

The heuristics included in Inhance have been developed by ImageCat's engineering and risk teams. Additional advanced heuristics are available in the Premium plan, including checks associated with building codes or specific territories and regions.

Exposure comparison datasets are third-party property exposure databases from a range of market-leading providers. These datasets include domestic and commercial address-level property attributes, engineering data and rebuilding costs. Fields include address, geocode, structure type, occupancy, year built, number of stories and square footage. Inhance users will purchase address-level data from these datasets to use for cross-validation of key exposures or those with inadequate data quality

Yes. Inhance has an extensive hazard data library containing global, national and local hazard datasets. Most nat-cat risks are covered, including earthquake, flood, wind, tsunami, landslide, liquefaction, subsidence and wildfire. We are constantly extending the number of hazard suppliers and our first-of-its-kind transactional pricing model, means you only need to pay for the data you need.

This is not under our direct control but we can find out how up to date each dataset is, and requests can be made to the providers on behalf of the community if more recent data is required. These request may incur an additional charge.

We have simplified the process of getting access to comparison and hazard datasets. Our click-through license for our Basic and Pro plans means you can access hundreds of data layers without having to wait days for your legal team to pore over the details.

The Inhance Data Market provides access to all major nat-cat hazards, including earthquake, flood, wind, tsunami, landslide, liquefaction, subsidence and wildfire. Additional datasets, including crime are included also. We are constantly increasing the geographic reach of our datasets and the diversity of our suppliers.

Hazard data is priced on a pay-per-record basis and prices start from £0.02 per record depending on the territory, hazard or provider. We have even provided some free global datasets to help you get going. You will only be charged for hazard data that is directly relevant for the exposures you are analysing (e.g. if you are processing data in UK, you will not be charged for US data).

Yes. We have gained access to a number of global hazard datasets. Users can use these free of charge to get a feel for how hazard data work in Inhance. These data can be displayed as layers on the map, or for ranking each of your risk locations according to the severity of hazard.

Tokens are the internal currency of Inhance. These allow data transactions to be made - either to access hazard data layers of exposure comparison data. A user adds a balance of tokens (e.g. £100) and tokens are deducted from the balance on a pay-per-use basis. The token system supports clear budgeting in your organisation and ensures that users are spending within your limits.

Users on the Pro and Premium plans each have the ability to spend tokens on data. These spending privileges are controlled by the company administrator, who can revoke or assign privileges as they deem necessary. Users on the Basic plan always have spending privilege as it is a single-user plan.

For Basic and Pro plans, a credit card is the quickest way for purchasing tokens for use in the Data Market. However, if you require invoicing please contact us.

No. If you choose to augment your data from external comparison data, or based on an analyst's interpretation, we will create a new dataset. This will be a copy of your existing data, with the new values you wish to update. For regulatory reporting, you can download the audit trail of the augmentations made.

Yes, this will be possible, though it will make sense to segment them (and the tool will help with this) into blocks to which particular rules and comparison datasets may be useful. For instance, you might believe that comparison dataset provider X provides detailed information for France but less useful data for Florida.

Inhance does not store credit card details, but uses a dedicated 3rd party to do this: Stripe (stripe.com) provides Inhance's secure payment engine. Stripe is a PCI Level 1 Service Provider and is registered on Visa's Global Registry of Service Providers. Learn more about their comprehensive, multi-level security certification and encryption here. It's why we chose them as partners.

Tokens to access data in the Data Market, and monthly charges for our Pro plan can be paid by credit card. Our payment engine accepts Visa, MasterCard, and American Express currently Contact us if you need to discuss invoice payments.

Inhance is a Software as a Service (SaaS) application built on an OpenStack platform. OpenStack is a robust and secure cloud computing project by Rackspace Cloud and NASA working with other key players including Citrix Systems, Dell, and enStratus. The Inhance data centre is located in Hampshire, England, and physical access to the servers are protected by biometric security.

Access to Inhance via web browser using HTTPS and SSL (using 256-bit encryption). The application is only accessible from registered IP addresses. FreeIPA authentication regulates external access to the web application and limits the context in which internal system components can access each another.

Contact us if you would like to discuss integration options for an on-your-premises version of Inhance.