Hurricane Ian’s recent ravaging of parts of Florida was a good reminder of the importance of preparedness. Florida residents who shuttered and sandbagged their homes, stocked up on supplies, or heeded warnings to leave fared much better than those who simply hoped for the best and then had to wait to be rescued.
Now imagine your state’s eligibility system. How prepared do you think it is? How do you think your eligibility system would handle an influx of SNAP, TANF, or Medicaid assistance requests caused by a real-life disaster, natural or otherwise? Or the disbursement or reversal of funds during another pandemic? What about hackers and mismanagement? Is your system ready for those as well?
Many of the Florida residents who needed rescue made false assumptions. Assumptions that ultimately got them in deep water. Similarly, your organization may assume that its development vendor has adequately prepared its eligibility systems. Relying on assumptions is dangerous. Don’t put your eligibility systems in a position where they may need to be rescued. Guarantee their correct and continuous operation by engaging iLAB’s independent Software Quality Assurance (SQA) and Testing professionals.
Hiring a separate and independent third party to conduct your SQA and testing activities serves as a check and balance for the creation and maintenance of your eligibility systems. Consider it akin to not allowing the fox to watch the henhouse. It is a wise decision and best practice for one vendor to develop code and another to test it. iLAB represents and protects your organization, not the development vendor. We are not beholden to the Developers who write the software code. We do the right amount of testing to eliminate risk and will point out code defects. iLAB will also represent your organization’s best interest by helping to institute process improvements.
iLAB has 25 years of independent SQA and testing expertise, with clients worldwide. We are exclusively used for independent SQA and testing services by the state of Indiana and have extensive experience working for multiple state agencies. iLAB understands the complexities and challenges human services face in implementing and maintaining their eligibility systems.
“iLAB has provided independent testing and quality assurance services for the state of Indiana’s Integrated eligibility modernization project,” says Sunshine Beam, Deputy Director of Indiana Division of Family Resources. “This testing was critical in ensuring the replacement of several legacy systems and integrating SNAP, TANF & Medicaid. The state of Indiana has also relied on iLAB post-go live in the System maintenance and Operation phase as a trusted advisor and auditor of our current testing practices. Throughout this engagement, iLAB has found defects that have resulted in a higher-quality system.”
Want to know more about iLAB’s approach to testing and maintaining state eligibility systems? iLAB representatives will be available in person at the 2022 ISM Annual Conference & Expo produced by the American Public Human Services Association (APHSA) for the Information Technology Solutions Management for Human Services (ISM) affinity group. The 2022 ISM Annual Conference & Expo runs from October 23 – 26. For more information, go to ISM 2022 – iLAB (ilabquality.com).