Covenant strengthens IMSIF’s digital foundation with Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central, Power BI, Fabric

August 20, 2025

On a quiet street in Illinois, a homeowner discovers a troubling sight: a crack snaking across their driveway. Little do they know that old coal mine tunnels deep underground have subtly shifted, leaving their property susceptible to damage from mine subsidence. For decades, the Illinois Mine Subsidence Insurance Fund (IMSIF) has been helping homeowners and businesses manage this risk by making sure they have access to financial resources when the ground literally shifts beneath their feet.

While IMSIF has been the steady support for property owners since 1979, they were facing their own challenge: legacy technology that made every claim, survey, and payment more complicated than it had to be. That's why they reached out to Covenant Technology Partners, a Microsoft Cloud Solution Provider (CSP) partner, who joined forces with IMSIF to reimagine and strengthen their foundation of support.

A custom legacy system and siloed data

IMSIF’s mission is as unique as it is essential. Created by state statute, the Fund helps assure financial resources are available to Illinois property owners at risk of mine subsidence, including through providing reinsurance to insurance companies, conducting investigations, supporting research, and educating the public.

Agile methodology lays the foundation for success

IMSIF needed a strategic partner with the expertise to guide them through this daunting transition. As a Microsoft partner for more than 20 years—with Solutions Partner designations in every solution area—Covenant fit the bill. From designing and implementing solutions to managing complex systems, they’ve proven their expertise in maximizing their customers’ technology investments across the entire Microsoft stack.

From the outset, Covenant understood IMSIF’s hesitation about moving from a solution tailored solely to their needs to a modern, out-of-the-box ERP platform like Microsoft Dynamics 365 Business Central. The challenge wasn’t just technological; it was cultural, too. That’s why Covenant took a different approach.

Instead of following a traditional, waterfall-style rollout (where months of planning precede any tangible results), Covenant pivoted to an agile methodology, introducing weekly or biweekly sprints and rapid feedback loops. With this approach, Covenant brought IMSIF directly into the planning and building phases, empowering them to shape their own system as it came to life.

That's how they quickly discovered that something as simple as customizing the terminology within Business Central to reflect IMSIF’s unique workflows—in this case, replacing “project” with “claim” in the application’s fields—made all the difference in driving adoption for the IMSIF team. “If they were doing a traditional waterfall, we would write up documentation and they would sign off, but they wouldn't see the solution for six months to eight months into the project,” explained Glatt. "The agile process allowed us to be grounded in a good methodology, and they had the ability to see and embrace a solution sooner.”

Total digital—and cultural—transformation

As IMSIF employees experienced firsthand how automation and integration could eliminate tedious work and drive smarter decision-making, their initial resistance gave way to engagement and empowerment. “Not only did they embrace the agile [approach], but they started to think outside of the box. How could they improve that manual process to now work with [the new system]?” Glatt said.

Covenant brought Microsoft Power BI and Fabric into the mix, connecting IMSIF’s data across claims, premiums, financials, and vendor management. The result: a 100% reduction in duplicate work for claims and premiums and a 300% reduction in the surveying team’s administrative burden—and “no more entering the same data three to four times,” Glatt added. Plus, with Power BI dashboards updated every 15 minutes via Fabric and Azure Data Lake, IMSIF leaders could make more informed decisions using real-time analytics.

At the heart of the entire project was Azure DevOps, which Covenant and IMSIF used as a central tool for tracking progress and sharing updates, insights, and feedback in real time. IMSIF had the power to set their own priorities and establish a clear and connected view of the project at every phase—whenever they added notes in DevOps, those updates were also sent to Microsoft Outlook and Teams so the entire team had visibility.

Beyond the technology, Covenant helped IMSIF change their mindset and way of working by meeting them where they were. As a result, “They were willing to listen and see through that iterative process, to embrace what we were showing them and really trust us as an extension of their family,” Glatt reflected. “All the kudos in the world go to the leadership of that IMSIF team. If it weren’t for them, we wouldn’t have been able to showcase a solution that is robust and built on a modern platform for them.”

Partnering for a stronger foundation

With Business Central, Power BI, and Fabric now at the heart of IMSIF’s operations, Covenant’s role has evolved from implementer to long-term partner. Recognizing IMSIF’s appetite for ongoing improvement after the project, Covenant offered a yearly managed services agreement to continue building their roadmap of enhancements together. Their arrangement encompasses security management, system maintenance, and access to Covenant’s experts to keep IMSIF secure, supported, and up to date with the latest Microsoft innovations.

As IMSIF sets their sights on the future, they can rest easy knowing their most critical processes are as resilient and dependable as the communities they serve. And while the risk of damage from mining subsidence remains, the foundation of support for Illinois homeowners is stronger than ever with IMSIF and Covenant.