Westfield Center, OH - October 25, 2005 - Applied Systems, Inc. presented Westfield Insurance with a 2005 Ease of Doing Business Award in both commercial and personal lines, recognizing insurance companies that make it easy for agents to conduct business through agency-company interface. Westfield was one of only sixteen companies judged best at providing standardized workflows for managing sales and service directly from their Applied management systems.

The awards were presented this week in Nashville, Tennessee, at 2005 TENCon, the 20th annual Technology, Education & Networking Conference hosted by Applied Systems Client Network (ASCnet) user group. Applied Systems and ASCnet presented awards based on each company’s level of participation in several categories of batch and real-time interface.

"Westfield is honored to receive this award from such a valued partner as Applied Systems," said Roger McManus, president of Westfield Insurance. "We understand the agents’ desire to start and finish in their management system, and we’re working to bring our agents additional integration functionality in the future."

Agencies using Applied TAM or Vision can access Westfield billing information, claims and loss run inquiry directly from their management system, and a real-time personal lines quoting bridge is currently available for agents in Ohio, Pennsylvania, West Virginia and Indiana. In addition, web site sign-on capability allows agencies direct access to Agent’s Web Passport from Applied.

In business for more than 157 years, Westfield Insurance provides commercial and personal insurance and surety services to customers in 28 states. Westfield markets its products through more than 1,200 leading independent insurance agencies and is one of the country’s largest property and casualty insurers. Westfield Group provides banking through Westfield BankSM and agency support through Westfield Services, Inc. Westfield has over $3.1 billion in assets and holds an "A (Excellent)" rating from A.M. Best, a leading insurance financial rating agency.

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