I will reply in this part of the thread, as it is the most recent. It's
somewhat difficult to say whether firms should be in one table or split into
several. As an example, Customers and Vendors are both companies with
addresses, etc., but are likely to contain substantially different types of
data, so it makes sense in most cases that they be in the same table. On the
other hand, supply vendors and service vendors are both vendors, even though
you may need certain fields for one and not the other (shipping information
may not apply to a service vendor, for instance). I part company here with
Steve's insistence that *all* of the fields need to be the same, but I think
it is true they should be substantially similar.

I do not really understand the concepts of Producer, Provider, and Insured as
they apply to your situation. If the Insured is the customer and the other
two are suppliers, the tables should be split up to that extent, I would
think. In any case, if you are using a combo or list box you probably want
to limit the list only to those who could by Providers or Producers or
Insureds.

Regarding the forums search, if you are using the Microsoft interface it can
be clunky. A Google Groups search is more likely to return the information.

oldblindpew wrote:
Thanks for your reply, Steve.

All of your perceptions are correct.

I assume by "standardized" you mean that each of these entities has a
standard set of fields. Everything is pretty well standardized until you get
down to the level of Coverage Details, which I had not mentioned until my
previous reply. At this level, coverage details differ by policy type, and
are more subject to change over time. The Normalized approach would be to
make a master list (table) of CoverageDetails, (or CoverageItems?), with a
many-to-many relationship between Policies and CoverageDetails.

It is more usual to say a Cert is "issued" (vs. "established") by a Producer.

Your solution is more like what I expected to receive from the outset: some
sort of multiplicity of join tables.

I have asked before about the wisdom of combining or splitting Firms by
type. Presently, all Firms are in a single table, with several Type fields
to indicate what types of work the firm does. This seems to be the preferred
approach. In your model, is there any reason why Insureds, Producers, and
Providers couldn't all be in the same table of Firms?

BTW, does anyone know why it is that if I search this forum for OldBlindPew,
I only get some of my threads?

Thanks again,
OBP

It is not clear to me if Agreements, Certs and Policies are standardized in
and of themselves. Presumably they are. It appears that an Agreement can
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