Essential Business Process Modeling

Chapter Ten. Example: Human Workflow in Insurance Claims Processing

IN THIS CHAPTER (AND THE NEXT), WE WILL BUILD FEATURE-RICH, working examples that demonstrate some of the key concepts of process modeling. This chapter shows the design of a BPEL insurance claims process that is driven by human workflow, or by human participants performing manual activities. (See the section "Human Interaction" in Chapter 2 for a discussion of human workflow architecture.)

The process is implemented in Oracle BPEL Process Manager , a BPEL 1.1-compliant runtime engine that includes a design editor, an administrative console, and a human task manager subsystem; this chapter provides everything you need to know to download, install, and configure a working environment for the example.^[*]

The UML activity diagram in Figure 10-1 provides a high-level overview of the behavior of the insurance process .

When the process begins, the Evaluate activity is started, which represents manual work in which an insurance agent examines the details of the claim and decides whether to accept or reject it outright, or to pass it to an adjuster for further analysis, as part of the

Figure 10-1. UML activity diagram of insurance process

Analyze activity. That activity can also result in an acceptance or refusal, and it can also time out if not completed in two days. The time-out triggers a transition to the Escalate activity, ...