With thousands of complaints still unresolved at the National Insurance Board of Trinidad and Tobago (NIBTT), the Board’s multi-million-dollar Empower Project remains under scrutiny after failing to deliver the improvements promised since its 2022 launch.
The Joint Select Committee on Finance and Legal Affairs launched an inquiry into the accessibility, responsiveness, and overall service delivery to citizens of Trinidad and Tobago by the NIB.
Addressing customer complaints, NIB Executive Director Niala Persad-Poliah announced that a three-step digital platform project, launched in 2022 to improve complaint handling and deliver timely responses, has yet to yield significant benefits to the public.
“For the solution implementation of Empower stands at TT$143 million plus VAT of $10.3 million with annual maintenance costs of TT$50 million plus VAT of $3.5 million and a recurring annual maintenance cost, Chairman, of approximately TT$18 million.”
Meanwhile, Executive Director of Human Resources, Isha Khan, noted that several existing staff were employed to tackle the backlog, but demand continues to outweigh capacity.
“So persons were reassigned intermittently, and I would say consecutively, roughly over the last two years, they would have been reassigned full-time. In terms of arrangements that we would have made internally to backfill, we would have used acting arrangements, and we also did bring on board an external contract vendor that provided external resources at the entry level of the organisation.”
NIB’s Executive Manager, Technology, Amanda Fulchan-Lakhan, said that the application, once complete, will greatly benefit vulnerable groups who rely on grants.
“Our UAT percentage completion is at 96%, and the solution is available. It can be logged into. We can review it. We have seen the integrations and operations, and we are just at the last push to complete our UAT and do what we consider to do end-to-end testing, which means we’ll be testing the solution in its completeness from receipt of claim to issuance of cheque or payment at the bank.”
The Empower project, initially projected to be completed within 18 months from its 2022 launch, has now stretched beyond 48 months.
Ms Persad-Poliah reported that the initiative still awaits approval from the new Board of Directors, along with additional funding and staff training, before citizens can experience the full benefits.