BUILT AROUND AGENCY-BILL WORK
iAutomate Erlon Surety and EvenPenny: what each one does.
A useful surety software comparison starts with the work your team needs to complete. An agency may need help issuing and tracking bonds, reconciling carrier statements, collecting customer balances, preparing remittances, or explaining producer results. Those requirements involve different records and different owners. iAutomate Erlon Surety organizes the bond workflow. [1] EvenPenny reconciles agency-bill statements and helps the agency work through the financial obligations around them. Start with the handoff that consumes the most time, identify the output the next person needs, and use that workflow to guide the comparison.
Define the decision before comparing features
Write down the handoff that currently requires the most intervention. Does a bond request lack complete information? Does accounting receive an issued transaction without the fields needed to bill? Does a carrier statement contain differences that nobody owns? Does the agency owner have to request several reports to understand outstanding work? These questions identify the outcome to demonstrate.
Next, assign a system of record to bond details, customer balances, carrier obligations, producer calculations, and general-ledger postings. The assignment can differ by agency. A clear ownership map helps you test whether a proposed tool completes the work, exchanges necessary data, or requires a manual handoff. Bring both an operations user and an accounting user to that review.
What iAutomate Erlon Surety does
Insurance Automation Group describes iAutomate Erlon Surety as an end-to-end bond workflow solution for agencies. Its agency page lists issuing, tracking, and executing bonds; premium and commission calculation options; bond history and an audit log; and reporting for principals, obligees, and management. It also describes customer-hosted and cloud-based versions and an integration with Surety2000 for electronic bid-bond data. [1]
IAG's integration page identifies certified integrations with Applied Epic, Applied TAM, AMS360, and Sagitta. It also describes connections involving Sage 50, Surety2000, Outlook, and authentication through LDAP. [2] Vertafore's listing describes the IAG relationship and Erlon integrations with AMS360 and Sagitta, positioning Erlon for larger brokerage operations and bond-only agencies. [3]
IAG's December 2, 2025 release announcement discusses Version 15, including office-level surety information and Surety2000 management, record inactivation, and enhancements involving Epic and Sagitta integrations. [4] For an operations team, the useful demonstration follows a bond from its initial record through changes, execution, reporting, and the handoff to billing. Include a changed premium so the team can follow the history through the process.
What EvenPenny does
EvenPenny reconciles surety agency-bill statements and handles the associated financial work: receivables, customer PDFs, user-initiated reminders, producer reports, remittance preparation, and an owner overview. Runs on exports from Vertafore AMS360. The general ledger, transaction, and activity exports provide the records used alongside the carrier statement.
EvenPenny reads 12 carrier statement formats across PDF, Excel, and CSV, including scanned PDFs read with OCR. New carrier formats are added during onboarding. It matches statement lines to AMS360 transactions on the same bond, allowing for prefix, suffix, and spelling differences in bond numbers and customer names.
You see three lists: ready to remit, needs review, and already paid. Totals foot to the carrier's statement total. Each exception shows the statement line and AMS360 entry side by side, with a suggested reason such as a rate difference, prior payment, missing transaction, or carrier error. EvenPenny generates the remittance from the verified list in the carrier's format, ready to copy into an email. Your team decides exceptions, approves the remittance, and sends the payment.
Running Applied Epic, HawkSoft, or EZLynx? Send us a sample export and we'll tell you what it takes.
Docket keeps the next action with the item
Docket is an exception tracker for the items that fall between the management system, the inbox, and reconciliation: unbilled renewals, closeouts waiting on a release letter, past-due collections, remittance holds, and carrier administration. Every item carries a next step, an assignee, who the agency is waiting on, a follow-up date, and a history.
The output is a copyable weekly open-items update. The Monday email comes out of the app with the unresolved work and next actions already organized. For a remittance hold, the team can keep the question, the responsible person, and the follow-up date together while the accounting decision is being resolved.
Docket is in development and available to early customers.
Follow the complete handoff through a sample case
Prepare a small transaction packet before the demonstration. Include the starting record, the statement, a customer payment, and a correction that changes the reporting. Use the same packet for each workflow review so the operations and accounting teams can compare the actions and outputs they will use in their daily work.
| Test item | Starting condition | Evidence to request |
|---|---|---|
| Bond TX-101 | $1,200 premium recorded | Trace the bond transaction to its billing record |
| Customer balance | $700 received against TX-101 | Explain the remaining $500 and show its source |
| Statement exception | $240 expected commission; $225 shown | Identify the $15 difference and who resolves it |
| Producer report | A correction affects TX-101 | Show how the approved correction reaches reporting |
| Carrier remittance | One disputed item remains open | Explain proposed treatment and the approval handoff |
Watch how a user resumes the case after another person has worked on it. Can the next operator identify the source, the correction, the reason, and the next action? Ask to see the final output as well as the screen used to prepare it. A customer PDF, producer report, or accounting export can reveal ambiguities that a dashboard summary conceals.
Keep the discussion tied to the item being reviewed. For the customer balance, ask where the $700 receipt appears and how the remaining $500 reaches the next collection action. For the commission difference, ask which source supports each amount and how the team records the decision. For the correction, follow the revised amount into the producer report.
Questions an operator should ask during the demo
- Where does the record begin? Identify the first entry point, required identifiers, duplicate checks, and the person responsible for missing data.
- How is a correction carried through? Change one approved amount and trace the effect on customer balances, carrier work, and producer reporting. Ask where a second manual action is necessary.
- How are unresolved items assigned? Show the owner, supporting evidence, next action, and the way the item is found in the following period.
- What happens at the handoff? Follow the prepared remittance or customer-facing output to the person who receives it. Identify the record that shows what was prepared and when.
- What can the next user inspect? Request the history available for a changed amount, an exported record, and a customer-facing output.
- What happens when data transfer fails? Show an invalid record, the error message, the retry process, and the method for preventing duplicate processing.
- What leaves the system? Obtain sample exports, field definitions, and an explanation of how the agency can retrieve its records at the end of the relationship.
Capture the result of each demonstration in an action list: the output reviewed, the person who will use it, the setup decision required, and the next step. Use the team's own operating questions to organize that list. The agency should be able to explain how the work moves from the source record to the person responsible for finishing it.
Review the handoff and implementation plan
Review the fields that join the working records: bond or policy reference, transaction date, premium, commission, customer reference, and producer assignment. Follow a correction through those fields and into the final report. Keep the original record available during the review so the team can explain exactly what changed and why.
Build the implementation plan around responsibilities. Name who prepares the exports, validates opening balances, reviews rejected records, trains substitute operators, and resolves questions after launch. Start with one statement period and carry its open items through the next review. That sequence gives the team a complete view of the recurring work, including what happens after the initial setup.
Use the outcome to choose the next step. For bond creation and execution, walk through iAutomate's documented workflow. For agency-bill reconciliation and the financial work that follows, walk through EvenPenny. Where the agency needs both, map the record that leaves one workflow and the output needed in the next. Give each handoff an owner so the ongoing process is clear.
Common questions
- What does each product focus on?
- IAG describes iAutomate Erlon Surety around bond issuance, tracking, execution, history, and reporting. [1] EvenPenny reconciles agency-bill carrier statements and supports receivables, customer PDFs, user-initiated reminders, producer reports, remittance preparation, and an owner overview.
- Does iAutomate integrate with AMS360 and Sagitta?
- Yes. IAG's integration page identifies both integrations, and Vertafore's listing also describes them. [2][3] In a demonstration, follow the bond and transaction records through to billing, then make a correction and review the resulting history and output.
- What should an agency bring to a comparison demo?
- Bring a sample transaction packet, a list of required outputs, and the people who own operations and accounting. Include a partial payment, a statement difference, and a correction. Follow each item to its final output and identify the person responsible for the next action.