File Naming Specification

Naming a File

The file name should, where possible, be a combination of the unique4-digit code assigned to the insurance company by Insure-Rite, the two-digit year and the two-digit month representing the month of the submission. The file extension should follow common naming specifications. For example, assume the four-digit code assigned to a company is "INSR"; and the company is submitting an Excel spreadsheet for May 2006. The file name would be INSR0605.xls; and the corresponding labeling file would be INSR0605.ini. The labeling file should always have the same file name as the data file with an ini extension. For the contents of the labeling file, please see labeling specifications.

It is understood that some programming systems cannot automatically generate the two digit year or the two digit month when naming a file. With this in mind, it is acceptable to name the file INSR.xls. The correspoding labeling file would be INSR.ini. It is futher understood, multiple companies can fall under the same group. If you are reporting multiple companies in the same file, you can use any of the four-digit codes.

Bi-Monthly Naming

The files are time stamped when they are received. With this in mind, insurance companies can use the same filename for the 7th and 21st submissions.   

Multiple Files

If an insurance company plans to submit multiple files for the same company for the same submision (e.g. sending data from seveal locations), or multiple files for several companies for the same submission. The files should have something at the end of the file to make them unique. Examples would be file1, 1, a, b -- anything that would make the file unique. Using the above example just using the code, assuming a second file is sent, the filenames would be INSRfile1.xls and INSRfile1.ini for the data file and labeling files respectively.   

Replacement Files

If an insurance company needs to send a replacement file, the file should include 'repl' just before the extension. Again, using the sample filename, the replacement files would be named INSRrepl.txt and INSRrepl.ini for the data and labeling files respectively.

Test Files

If an insurance company needs to send a test file, the file should include 'testl' just before the extension. Again, using the sample filename, the replacement files would be named INSRtest.txt and INSRtest.ini for the data and labeling files respectively.