AETNA, HARTFORD, CT

Using to Topper  manage complex messaging systems

Aetna, headquartered in Hartford Connecticut, is one of the largest and most progressive Insurance companies in the USA. Its e-mail network comprises a variety of systems including some 8,000 users on OfficeVision/VM, 28,000 users across 300 Post Office's on Microsoft Mail with links to the SoftSwitch Central product to which X.400 and DEC connections are also made. Aetna has embarked on a major migration project to move the majority of mainframe users to LANs, using Microsoft Mail as the messaging standard.

Given the size, complexity and volatility in the current network, Aetna found it very difficult to accurately monitor the mail system with the tools it had. Its mail monitor was unable to manage all 300 Post Offices simultaneously which forced the company to implement probing only to the most critical post offices. Similarly, there was no real-time reporting and, although monthly statistics could be produced, it still required a high degree of manual tallying at end of month to get them into a usable format. Having committed to a Service Level Agreement of 30 minutes end to end mail delivery, it was difficult for Aetna management to extract accurate information to know whether the messaging system was in compliance with the agreed Service Level.

Topper, from Bear Mountain Software, was implemented to alleviate these problems. A single copy of the product was installed in the company's Hartford headquarters from where e-mail network connections could be defined to Topper. Tests were created to poll all network nodes at intervals of 90 minutes, including links to X.400, SMTP and OfficeVision.

Benefits derived from Topper were in three key areas. Toppers real-time monitoring now provides the mail administrators with instant visual alerts of developing problems at any node in the network, allowing them to react to problems far more responsively and proactively. The central Topper system is accessed by multiple people in the support areas who are distributed across the network, allowing everyone to share and react to the same status information. Aetna is now able to run service level reports at daily, weekly and monthly intervals which can be used for identifying problems in individual nodes as well as reporting compliance with the 30 minute Service Level Agreement.

As an added benefit, Topper's feature of highlighting slowdowns in mail delivery has been used to inform Aetna staff of pending network failures and network congestion.