How Much Time Does COI Tracking With Certificial Take?

As most risk teams know, manual COI (certificate of insurance) tracking can easily consume 3-4 hours per person every day. You can easily spend the whole morning chasing down expired certificates, reviewing PDFs for coverage gaps, updating spreadsheets, and sending follow-up emails about renewals. 

For a larger company with 5+ employees handling third-party COIs, 400+ payroll hours are spent on insurance tracking.

Certificial is a COI tracking platform that automates vendor insurance compliance. Most team members spend under 30 minutes daily on COI tasks with Certificial. Here's what actually happens during those 30 minutes.

Learn more about Certificial and what working in it looks like here.

Morning Login: What Needs Attention Today

You log into Certificial and immediately see which vendors need your attention. Certificial automatically validates every certificate against your company's requirements and flags only the items that need human review.

Reviewing Pending Compliance (15-20 minutes)

The pending compliance queue in Certificial shows vendors who either submitted initial COI responses or had coverage changes. You spend 15-20 minutes reviewing these flagged items. For straightforward cases where coverage meets requirements, you approve them quickly in the platform. Items that need higher-level approval automatically route to managers who can make those decisions.
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Handling Exceptions (5-10 minutes)

Sometimes business needs require accepting coverage that doesn't perfectly match your standard requirements. You grant these approvals directly in Certificial, and the system documents your decisions. Standard exceptions get handled quickly, while unusual cases that fall outside normal parameters go to managers for review.
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Requesting COIs from New Vendors (5 minutes)

If you have new vendors joining this week, you send COI requests directly through Certificial. The vendors receive your specific coverage requirements through the platform, connect with their insurance agents, and those agents generate Smart COIs from verified policy data. Certificial only accepts certificate submissions from insurance agents, not from vendors or subcontractors, which helps eliminate fraudulent COIs.
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Removing Inactive Vendors (5 minutes)

You spend a few minutes canceling tracking in Certificial for vendors who are no longer working with your company. This keeps your vendor list current and eliminates unnecessary monitoring overhead.

That's the entire daily commitment - Certificial handles everything else automatically.

What COI Tracking Tasks Certificial Automates

While you handle those daily tasks, Certificial manages everything else without manual intervention. Traditional COI tracking involves constant email chains, calendar reminders for renewals, manual PDF reviews, and data entry across multiple systems. Certificial eliminates this work through automated processes.

When insurance agents submit Smart COIs through Certificial, the platform validates coverage against your requirements in real time. Certificial's automated compliance checks identify issues instantly for all parties involved. Agents manage renewals and coverage changes directly from their primary management systems, and Certificial's Smart COIs update automatically based on verified policy data. Certificial monitors continuously and sends alerts only when someone needs to take action.

Certificial only accepts certificate submissions from insurance agents, not from vendors or subcontractors. Insurance agents generate certificates directly from their management systems rather than asking vendors to fill out forms or provide information. This approach helps eliminate fraudulent COIs and ensures the data matches what's actually on file with the carrier.

How Certificial Scales With Your Vendor Base

Companies grow their vendor bases constantly, but that growth doesn't have to mean hiring more compliance staff. Certificial's automation allows teams to handle COI compliance in the same 30 minutes or less whether they're managing 50 vendors or 500. Managers spend their time only on exception approvals that require their authority while directors and VPs stay entirely removed from day-to-day operations.

Traditional manual tracking doesn't scale this way. Each new vendor brings more email threads, additional spreadsheet rows, extra calendar reminders, and more manual reviews. The workload increases linearly with vendor count. Certificial handles thousands of vendors with the same limited time commitment because its automation does the repetitive work that would otherwise require additional staff.

Time for Work That Actually Needs You

When Certificial handles the administrative burden of COI tracking, risk team members redirect their expertise toward work that requires human judgment and strategic thinking. Compliance analysts spend more time on vendor risk assessments, policy development, and addressing complex coverage scenarios that need subject matter expertise. Risk managers focus on building relationships with key vendors, negotiating insurance requirements for high-risk contracts, and contributing to broader enterprise risk strategy.

The goal is not to do less work but to do more valuable work. Certificial removes the hours spent chasing certificates and updating spreadsheets so teams can focus on analysis, strategy, and the nuanced decisions that actually protect the organization. Your expertise becomes more valuable when you're not buried in administrative tasks.

How Certificial's Smart COI Process Works

Certificial connects your vendor onboarding process directly to insurance agents, creating a streamlined workflow that eliminates back-and-forth communication.

You start by requesting coverage with your specific requirements through Certificial. The vendor receives this request through the Certificial platform and connects their insurance agent. The agent then generates a Smart COI in Certificial directly from verified policy data rather than relying on information the vendor provides. Certificial only accepts submissions from insurance agents, not from vendors or subcontractors, which helps eliminate fraudulent COIs.

Certificial validates coverage automatically against your requirements as soon as the agent submits the certificate. All parties see compliance issues in real time through Certificial, so problems get addressed immediately rather than creating delays later. Agents manage renewals from their existing systems, which means Certificial's Smart COIs update automatically when policies renew or coverage changes. You don't send reminder emails or chase down updated certificates.

Certificial's continuous monitoring runs without manual intervention. The platform watches for coverage changes, policy cancellations, and expiring certificates. Certificial sends alerts when someone needs to take action, but otherwise stays silent.

For industries like construction, Certificial's completed operations monitoring continues even after vendors finish their work. This ensures coverage remains in place for claims that may arise months or years after project completion.

Frequently Asked Questions

How much time do teams typically spend on COI tracking without automation?

Manual COI tracking typically requires 3-4 hours daily per person. That includes spreadsheet maintenance, email follow-ups, manual PDF reviews, and data entry across various systems. Some teams have dedicated staff who do nothing but chase certificates all day.

When do users actually need to take action in Certificial?

Users act only when vendors have pending compliance reviews, when exceptions need approval, when adding new vendors, or when removing inactive vendors. The continuous monitoring happens automatically in the background.

What happens if a vendor's coverage changes mid-term?

Smart COIs update automatically when agents make changes in their management systems. The platform flags any compliance issues immediately and notifies relevant parties, but you don't have to request the updated certificate or manually verify the changes.

How does Certificial work with existing vendor management systems?

Certificial integrates with vendor management, procurement, and risk management tools. Compliance data flows to where your teams already work. You don't need to log into multiple systems or manually transfer information between platforms.

How does Certificial reduce fraud risk in COI tracking?

Certificial only accepts certificate submissions from insurance agents, not from vendors or subcontractors. Insurance agents generate certificates directly from their management systems rather than asking vendors to fill out forms. This ensures the data matches what's actually on file with the carrier and helps eliminate fraudulent COIs.

Can Certificial scale as our vendor base grows?

Teams handle compliance in the same 30 minutes or less whether managing 50 vendors or 500. The workload stays constant because automation handles the repetitive tasks that would normally increase with vendor count.

What Certificial Delivers

Certificial reduces COI management to 30 minutes or less daily for most risk team members. Executives spend zero time on day-to-day operations. This reduction comes from Certificial's automated compliance validation that checks every certificate against your requirements without manual review. It comes from eliminating the email chains that typically consume hours each week. It comes from Certificial's real-time updates directly from insurance agents instead of accepting submissions from vendors or subcontractors.

Certificial scales without requiring additional staff. Teams manage expanding vendor bases within the same limited daily time commitment regardless of growth. People focus on exceptions and decisions that require human judgment, vendor risk analysis, policy development, and strategic initiatives rather than administrative tasks that Certificial's software handles automatically. The time saved goes toward work that actually needs your expertise.

Ready to see Certificial COi Tracking platform in action?

Request a demo here

*Certificial research team evaluates COI tracking tools using vendor demos, user feedback, and documented feature tests.

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