AMS360: renewal and follow-up automation for small agencies

In a five-person agency on AMS360, the renewal process is often one person. When that person is out for a week, nobody knows which renewals were already started. Follow-ups on policy changes and certificates work the same way: they get remembered or they don’t. AMS360 has the pieces to fix both. Renewal lists can be assigned to people, suspenses can be created in batches for every expiring policy, and suspense due dates can be set by default for routine actions. This guide puts those pieces together into a weekly routine that someone covering for a coworker could pick up.

Everything here is from Vertafore’s public AMS360 help site. Screens vary by version and by your security settings, so if something isn’t on your menu, ask your AMS360 administrator first and Vertafore support second.

What you need

AMS360 (Vertafore). Pricing isn’t published; it’s quoted per agency.
Security permissions. To create and assign renewal lists you need the secured item Menu - Toolbox: Renewal List Tool in Security Group Setup. Activity/Suspense Setup is in the Administration Center, so that’s usually an admin task.
Correct Executive and Representative on every policy. The batch tools assign suspenses to “Representative on policy” or “Executive on policy.” Blank fields mean unassigned work.
Microsoft Word and Outlook if you want to send merged renewal emails from AMS360. The email workflow runs through Word’s mail merge.

Step by step

1. Create one action code per renewal touchpoint

In AMS360, an activity’s Action is what it was. A suspense is the follow-up. Go to Administration Center > Activity/Suspense Setup and add actions such as:

Renewal - Info Requested
Renewal - Quote Requested
Renewal - Offer Sent
Renewal - Confirmed

Each action has a Suspense Days field. That’s the default number of days before the follow-up is due. Vertafore’s own example: for a Policy Change, you typically follow up two weeks later, so you enter 14. For renewal actions, try 7 days for Info Requested, 10 for Quote Requested and 5 for Offer Sent.

Get the names right before you save. Vertafore’s help says that once an action is saved it cannot be edited. You can only mark it inactive. Type the list out on paper first.

While you’re in that screen, set sensible suspense days on the routine non-renewal actions too: policy changes (14), certificates and claims (your call). That’s the “follow-up automation” most small agencies are missing.

2. Build and assign the renewal list

On the 360 Toolbox menu, open the Renewal List Tool. Enter criteria to pick which policies go on the list. Vertafore says the options are similar to the Expiration/Renewal report: date range, executive, representative, type of business and so on.

Then assign the policies. You can send an employee the whole list, or only some of its policies. Click Send to ‘Assign To’ Employee to distribute them.

For a small agency, a monthly rhythm works: on the first business day of each month, build a list of everything expiring in month +3 (so on October 1, December expirations), split by representative.

3. Work renewals from My Expiring Policies

Each employee’s assigned renewals show in the My Expiring Policies view in the Home Center. From that view you can:

Enter renewal comments (and optionally log an activity or note)
Create the renewal or rewrite
Open a submission group if you’re remarketing
Reassign the policy to a coworker
Mark it complete

Per Vertafore, the complete status updates automatically when the policy’s stage changes to Cancelled, Expired, Nonrenewed, Renewed or Rewritten.

Set up the Out of Office Assistant too. It lets an employee name a backup for their assigned expiring policies. This is the step that fixes the “she’s on vacation and nobody knows” problem.

4. Batch-create suspenses for every expiring policy

This is the closest AMS360 gets to “set it and forget it” for renewals. Go to Toolbox > Launch Programs > Suspense Utility.

In the expiring-policy section you set:

Action (your Renewal - Info Requested code), Priority and a Description
Due date: a specific date, or # of Days Prior to Expiration
Suspend To: Representative on policy, Executive on policy, or a named employee
Policy criteria: type of business, bill method, division, executive, and policy status flags
Expiration window: expiring in exactly X days, in X to Y days, or between two dates

A practical setup, run every Monday:

Run	Policies expiring in	Action	Due	Suspend to
A	91 to 97 days	Renewal - Info Requested	90 days prior	Representative
B	61 to 67 days, commercial only	Renewal - Quote Requested	60 days prior	Executive
C	31 to 37 days	Renewal - Offer Sent	30 days prior	Representative

A 7-day window each week means nothing falls between runs, and every suspense lands due sometime in the coming week rather than already overdue. The same utility can also reassign one employee’s suspenses to another over a date range. Use it when someone leaves or goes on leave.

5. Log every touch as an activity with a suspense

When a CSR emails or calls the client, they log it: Actions > New Activity from the customer. Choose the action, add a description, attach the email if there is one, and mark Create Suspense. The To field defaults to you. Pick a due date or enter a number of days and AMS360 works out the date. Then Save & Close.

The rule: no renewal suspense gets completed without a new activity saying what happened next.

6. Send renewal emails to a list

AMS360 can email a group of customers with merged fields. The workflow from Vertafore’s help:

Build a Target List (Home Center > Views > Target Lists > New Target List), run the query, fill the grid and save.
From the target list, click the Form Letter icon, pick a category and document, and add an activity description.
Check that activity logging for Form Letters is on in Activity/Suspense Setup, so each customer gets an activity.
File > Edit & Merge, then in Word: Mailings > Finish & Merge > Send E-Mail Messages, with the Cust_EMail merge field in the To box.

Use this for the information-request email (“your renewal is coming up, has anything changed?”), not for renewal offers. A renewal offer shows price and coverage, so a licensed producer should review each one before it goes out. That’s an E&O habit, not a software setting. My 90/60/30-day cadence guide has template wording.

If you want emails and texts that go out on their own based on renewal dates, AMS360 on its own isn’t built for that. Vertafore’s AgencyZoom is one add-on option, and my AgencyZoom guide covers it. Check with Vertafore about the integration and cost for your account. Whatever you use, only text clients who’ve given consent, keep texts informational, and make sure STOP replies are honored, as the TCPA requires.

7. Check overdue suspenses weekly

Run the Suspense report from 360 Toolbox > Classic Reports > Reports - All. Filter Status to Not Completed and set the due-date range to end yesterday. Sort by due date. Anything on it more than a week overdue gets a conversation, not a reminder.

Common mistakes

Saving action codes in a hurry. You can’t rename them later, only deactivate them, and the junk stays in your lists.
Running the Suspense Utility once. It’s a batch tool, not a rule. Put the Monday run on someone’s calendar.
Suspending to a named person instead of “Representative on policy.” When that person leaves, their suspenses go with them.
Skipping the Out of Office Assistant. It takes five minutes and covers the most common way renewals slip at a small agency.
Emailing renewal offers by mail merge. Fine for “has anything changed?”, risky for anything with a premium on it.

When it’s worth getting help

If you’re on AMS360 with a small team, steps 1 to 5 are a half-day setup that pays off the first month. Where agencies usually want a hand is the layer AMS360 doesn’t do natively: timed emails and texts, reply detection, and a weekly overdue summary sent to the owner. The insurance automation page covers how I approach that. The cost calculator gives a rough figure for whether it’s worth it at your size.