Travis Software Official Blog - Home

QB Document Upload: New in WebCOBRA

2009-01-05T14:42:00Z

On Sunday, January 4, 2008, we added a new feature to WebCOBRA that allows most users to upload a document for a QB Group from the History tab.

If you’ve ever wanted to upload a scanned version of a signed enrollment form or any other documentation that you’d like to have for future reference, now you can!

To upload a document for a QB Group:

1. From the History tab, select Upload Document on the bottom of the page.

2. Browse to find the document you wish to upload, select Save Document File.

3. If the file was saved correctly, you will see “Your file was saved Correctly.”

4. Select the Close button.

5. The History page will then reload and you will see your uploaded file.

The record for the newly uploaded document will show the Effective Date it was uploaded, the User who uploaded the document, the the Item with the description you have entered, and under Change it will state Uploaded, along with the date it was uploaded with a link to view the document.

Only site users will have the ability to upload scanned .pdf documents. If you previously did this using our WebCOBRA Scanner application, it will still work, but you may find this process easier and more convenient to use.

This product enhancement came directly from you off of the Travis Ideabook. Thank you for your Ideas, and if you haven’t started using the Ideabook yet, sign-up and start voting!

2009 WebCOBRA Release Schedule

2009-01-02T20:28:00Z

You may not know it, but you’ve been a part of the latest WebCOBRA release for several weeks now. Beginning in December 2008, our Developers and Operations personnel have been beta testing a new way to deliver features to you that accomplishes our main goals for WebCOBRA:

Build upon our Stability by reducing change.
Get features to customers faster.
Build our community by taking guidance on the features you want.

WebCOBRA 9 is a shift from our previous method of large seasonal releases (which you can read about here, here, and here). With our Continual Release Cycle, you’ll see a feature pop up every week to every couple of weeks. As soon as a feature is mandated by changes in the law, or if we love it so much that we want to include it, or if the community reaches critical mass on the IdeaBook, we will devote resources to the idea, go through our four levels of testing, and deploy it out.

We’ll then outline the details of the release here on our blog, specifically in the new-features section. Some of the features we’ve released using this method include:

Uploading PDFs directly to QB records – installing this weekend
Note Count for QB and Client/Employers
Relational API Auto Delivery
Employee Listing Report

We are very excited about releasing software using this method. We’ll reduce the downtime that we usually spend installing big releases, and we think you’ll truly enjoy being able to get features on a continual basis.

Note Count Feature: New in WebCOBRA

2008-12-30T14:38:00Z

We just added a new feature to WebCOBRA that allows you to see the number of notes you have for either a QB or Client/Employer without actually going into the Notes section!

Now, anytime you have at least one note in the system, you will be able to see it on the Notes tab in either the QB or Client/Employer detail screens.

This product enhancement came directly from you off of the Travis Ideabook. Thank you for your Ideas, and if you haven’t started using the Ideabook yet, sign-up and start voting!

Happy Holidays from Travis Software

2008-12-19T22:29:00Z

Have a safe and happy Holiday Season from Travis Software!

The video below (view here if you're having trouble: http://vimeo.com/2578433) shows our Development and Administration team, then our Sales/Marketing teams, and finally our Support Department.

You can view our our holiday schedule post to see when we're open. Have fun in the next two weeks!

RelationalAPI Auto Delivery - New in WebCOBRA

2008-12-17T17:21:00Z

The RelationalAPI in WebCOBRA allows users to get a copy of their database in Microsoft Access form. When first launched in 2007, we allowed one download per week; once we could successfully handle the demand, we upped it to a daily download. Now, you can ask WebCOBRA to auto-deliver you a daily copy of your database!

You can find our new “Automation” modules in the IT Resources section in WebCOBRA. Supervisor users are able to tell WebCOBRA to auto-deliver the RelationalAPI either in the morning (6AM CST) or at night (7PM CST).

Our “robot” will create your copy, store it, and email you a link so that you can download it. This will save our larger users hours, as you previously needed to submit your request for RelationalAPI, wait for it to process, and then receive a link (sometimes an hour or more later).

You could even program a listener to watch for your stored email address (something like relationalapi@yourtpahere.com), and auto-download and refresh your database. We think this workflow is very exciting, and can provide an end-to-end automation of the refresh of your data. Your IT Department will love you!

Our automation engines are currently available as add-on modules. If you’d like to take advantage of the new capability, please contact our sales department at 281-496-3737.

Travis 2008 End-of-Year Schedule

2008-12-15T21:18:00Z

With the holidays fast approaching, we wanted to make sure all of our customers are aware of our operating hours for the next two weeks. Unless noted below, Travis Software will be open for our normal business hours.

December 24, 2008: Our offices will close at 12:00pm CST.
December 25, 2008: Closed
December 26, 2008: Closed
December 31, 2008: Our offices will close at 4:30pm CST
January 1, 2008: Closed

Travis Software would like to wish everyone a safe and happy holiday season!

Spotlight on Travis: Chadd Mikulin

2008-12-12T21:59:00Z

Chadd is the Director of Product Development here at Travis Software, and he has been with the company since July 2007. He earned his Bachelor of Science in Computer Science degree in 2002 from Texas A&M University, and got his start in the software industry by working as a Development Manager for another software company in Plano, TX.

Have you ever been curious who works at Travis? Well, “Spotlight on Travis” is your answer! We will regularly interview a member of our team so that you can get to know our staff a little better, and today, you’re going to get to know Chadd Mikulin.

When asked why he liked working for Travis Software, Chadd said, “Professionally, the technology I get to work with on a daily basis is really cool, and I’m always learning and working on new things. Personally, I like the people here, and it’s fun to get to work with my friends!”

Aside from working at Travis, Chadd enjoys, in no particular order, reading, video games, cycling, and brewing beer. Chadd is also a terrific cook. He won first prize in the annual 4th of July Travis Dessert Contest with his I-45 bars.

Chadd’s final comment for his Spotlight, “Go Astros!”

Check back soon for the next addition of “Spotlight on Travis!”

Employee Listing Report - New in WebCOBRA

2008-11-18T15:47:00Z

We just added a new report to WebCOBRA that lists your Employees, grouped by department, and it’s available now!

When we enhanced the QB Status Report by splitting it into two reports, the QB Status History Report and the QB Enrolled Premiums Report, users noticed that they no longer had a report designed to show the Employees in the system.

We heard you, and created the Employee Listing Report. You can view a sample report here

The report is designed to allow administrators to provide their clients with a listing of all current employees in the system. This can then be compared against the client’s list to determine if any employees need to be notified of COBRA (the DOL COBRA General Notice.) The report can be grouped by department and totals come from both the department and the client/employer levels.

Like all reports in WebCOBRA, you can elect to hide the SSN using the QBID or QBGroup ID. You can also export the reports to Excel, PDF, CSV, XML, and TIFF files, and email the report either on demand or setup a Report Subscription to automatically email the report on a recurring basis.

TBILL 8.1 is Out!

2008-11-05T21:27:00Z

As you might have heard, we recently released version 8.1 of our desktop based premium billing system, TBILL. This new release contained some new features that we believe you will find helpful through your daily administration.

The new features available to you with this new release are:

TBill now automatically checks for updates.
You can disburse premium payments.
You have a new report that will extract all enrollment data per benefit.
You have the ability to subtotal a billing statement by division/branch.
You have a new report that will show all under and over payments.
You have a reminder for participants who pay premiums via ACH.
There is an additional relationship available for dependents when assigned to a participant.

Do you have an idea you think should go into the next release of TBILL?

Well then head on down to our Ideabook and create your own ideas and vote on existing ones to help us in deciding what will be in the next release of TBILL.

If you haven’t viewed or used the Ideabook, go to http://ideabook.travisoft.com and see for yourself how this new tool can make a difference.

Rock the Ideabook!

2008-11-03T22:20:00Z

The right to vote doesn’t end after Nov. 4. Although the polling booths may close, you can still vote on Ideabook!

We are rocking the vote on Ideabook at Travis Software. We have already implememented ideas from IdeaBook and need your input to help decide what else to put into the systems.

If you don’t already know, Ideabook is the new forum for submitting enhancement requests. You post your ideas, other users vote on it, and you can vote on other ideas!

IdeaBook also allows you to add comments to an “Idea” posted by someone else! So you can expand the idea, give additional options, or comment on how this would help your team.

Over the years some of the best additions to our systems have come from you, the user! So use IdeaBook as a platform to share ideas, express your thoughts, and know that we are following it closely.

Currently, some ideas on IdeaBook include: Automatically emailing an employer when a QB elects COBRA, adding an easier way to elect coverage for spouse only, adding a notification that there is a note on a QBs record and many more!

We want to know how you feel about all these “ideas” and what “ideas” you have, so log into Ideabook at http://ideabook.travisoft.com and express your right to vote!

Spotlight on Travis: Chris Vasquez

2008-10-27T20:06:00Z

Chris Vasquez

Chris is the Senior Support Representative here at Travis Software, and he has been with the company since June 2002.

When asked why he liked working for Travis Software, Chris responded, “I can be myself! We know how to have a great time here together and still get our work done. My co-workers within each department are like a second family to me. We take care of one another, joke with each other, and play, or at least try, Rock Band together everyday!”

Aside from working at Travis, Chris is a musician. He plays for several bands within the more radio “unfriendly” scene. Chris plays the guitar and programs music via both keyboards and computers. Additionally, he is a big fan of new and classic video games. He also mentioned that he puts hot sauce on everything!

Check back soon for the next addition of “Spotlight on Travis!”

Travis Moving Offices

2008-10-22T19:03:00Z

We will shut off the phones and our network this Friday, October 24th and 12:30 Central Time, and begin the process of moving from the 5th floor down to the 2nd. WebCOBRA will not be affected in any way.

New Address

We’re still in the same building, but now in suite 250. Our full address is

Travis Software Corp.
1155 Dairy Ashford
Suite 250
Houston, TX 77079

Timeline

We’ll shut down our network access and phone systems at 12:30 PM CST – but you can still submit cases via our self-service portal. Any phone calls or FTP transfers will be cut off and emails will be in a holding pattern: we’ll still get them, just not right away. We will then roll our server racks to the elevator, down to the 2nd floor, past our locked doors that only IT has the code to, and up onto our raised floor mini-datacenter.

Matt Singleton will plug-in our phone system and bring in our upgraded internet circuit, and cut-over to the new system.

We will be back online by Monday morning. In the mean-time, please file cases using the self-service portal.

What about WebCOBRA

WebCOBRA is stored outside of our building in two datacenters and will not be affected by our office move.

Common Problem: Adding Dependents to a QB

2008-10-21T15:30:00Z

By Debi Ostrom and Ben Tillman

Working day in and day out, Travis Support has identified some common problems and questions they hear on a regular basis that usually have simple solutions, so we are going to address some of them here. The first one we are going to address is adding additional dependents to an existing QB.

Let’s say you are notified that a QB just had a baby or just got married and you need to add a dependent to their record but are unsure of how to do this.

To accomplish this task, all you have to do is:

1. View the QB’s record, and at the top of the page, select where it says “QB Group.”

2. Once you are viewing the QB group, select View/Edit Qualified Beneficiary Group.

3. Next, select “Add Additional QB to this QB Group.”

4. You will then be guided through a wizard (the first step of which, is shown below) similar to the QB Add wizard where it will ask you for the dependent’s information.

5. Once you reach the last step (Step 4) and select “Save and Add New QB to Group”, your new Dependent will be added to the QB Group.

Now, when you view the QB Group, you will see the QB with their dependent listed below.

Keep checking the offical Travis Software Blog for more answers to common problems and questions!

Feature Overview: WebCOBRA Summer 2008

2008-10-10T19:40:00Z

The Summer 2008 release of WebCOBRA.com was made available September 28, 2008, and, so far, we’ve told you about some great new features. Are you wondering what else was added to the system?

Upload Documents: Administrators can now upload and publish documents such as SPDs, procedures for claims, benefit summaries, and many more to WebCOBRA.com. These documents can then be viewed by Qualified Beneficiaries and, when applicable, retirees.
HIPAA Certificates: Another new feature that was added to WebCOBRA is the HIPAA Certificate Delivery option. This option will allow you to send dependents their own HIPAA Certificate by simply selecting either “Yes or No.”
Matrix Plan Types: There are three new options when you’rer using the Table Based Matrix Costing for benefit plans. For your convenience, tables can now be formed based on years of service, salary, and gender.

This isn’t all we’ve added to WebCOBRA in the Summer 2008 release. For more information on new features, visit our website at www.webcobra.com!

Retiree Billing: Now Available on WebCOBRA.com

2008-09-29T16:23:00Z

The Summer 2008 release of WebCOBRA is complete, and was made available on Sunday, September 28. Over the next few weeks, we are going to highlight some of the new features that we have added to the system.

Retiree Billing is one of the major features added to the WebCOBRA.com system. With this new Add-on Module, you can now enroll and track your Retirees, and their benefits, with the same ease that you have tracking COBRA Participants.

How will an online Retiree Billing system help you? Just like administering COBRA in WebCOBRA.com, Retiree Billing can:

Allow Retirees to Log-in online and view their account, contact, and payment information.
Allow Retirees to initiate online payments themselves.
Gives Administrators the ability to set up benefit plans based on age, salary, and years of service.

This isn’t all we’ve added to WebCOBRA in the Summer 2008 release, check back next week and we’ll tell you about another important feature!