Every insurance company has its own set of incentive schemes. These range from monetary incentives to club memberships and free trips.

The sales people need to be aware of the schemes well in advance, so that they know how much they need to achieve in the next week or two before the incentive scheme closes. The sales support team, who are directly employed by ING Vysya Life, need to communicate this information to the sales force. The sales support team also needs to monitor the working of the sales agents.

At ING Vysya Life, like most other insurance companies, this vital data was managed on Excel sheets -- a system the company used since its inception in 2001. Needless to say, this information was plagued by inaccuracy and a lack of transparency.

The sales support team had to answer frequent queries and address the grievances from the field force. They had to explain to the agents why they did not make it to a particular scheme.

"The problem was that as there was no proper communication throughout the process, at the end of the day when the payment was made the sales force wondered how the support team arrived at it. It was a very people hungry process. This would waste a lot of time of the sales support team," says Subramanian.