.png)
Quality Assurance
Case Study #1
Washington Health Benefit Exchange
HealthPlanFinder Modernization Project
October 2023 – June 2025
Program Summary
The Washington Health Benefit Exchange (WAHBE) is a quasi-governmental agency that is responsible for Washington State’s health insurance exchange, known as Healthplanfinder. The Washington Healthplanfinder (HPF) system launched in 2014 to support Washington’s implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA). The Exchange built HPF using monolithic architecture, which was a common approach for enterprise applications. Technology has since progressed, and a more modern and modular architecture is needed to meet the organization’s evolving needs for quicker and higher quality product delivery.
The current system is extremely stable, but its monolithic architecture is built on non-cloud native platforms. The technologies that undergird the application are approaching end of life. Re-platforming HPF is expected to reduce the costs of supporting non-cloud native infrastructure and provide new ways to scale system components. Modularizing HPF’s business functions will allow greater flexibility as system changes can be made independently of each other.
The project applied modern technologies to improve the system architecture as it was developed into smaller modules that align with business capabilities. The new HPF system was designed with improved user experience functionality and improved back office operations with modern security protocols and application design standards to support the long term applicability and viability of the HPF application into the future.
Our Solution
The ISG QA team provided Quality Assurance services that helped the project to successfully perform a major system upgrade from on-premises systems on an Oracle database to a modern Azure Cloud environment without any downtime or loss of functionality for the Health Benefit Exchange. The platform change saved the Exchange over $1 million in licensing fees and provided significantly improved performance, providing a better customer experience. The project's success in moving to the Cloud paved the way for a second move planned from the Azure Government Cloud to Azure Commercial Cloud, providing additional tools and performance improvement for the HealthPlanFinder Application.
As the project approached the Go Live date for the Cloud solution, the QA team recommended that the project consult a third party to validate its technical approach. The third-party vendor rapidly assessed the project’s migration plans and identified several areas for additional work prior to Go Live. The project applied the recommendations from the vendor and achieved a near-perfect Go Live without any significant performance issues. The QA team identified the right resources at the right time to assist the agency in completing the project successfully and transparently to its end users.