Member Intake Automation

When we loaded member files for our clients, managing member population was a labor-intensive, error-prone process.

Daily Member intake files would entail receiving a file through sftp, an ops team member would manually pull the file and map it to a standard format. Once the file was done being mapped, manually load the file into our local system and review results. If errors existed, manually send extract them and send back to the client to fix. For large clients with thousands of members, this process could take hours, this would delay the file intake and tie up multiple staff members on purely mechanical work.

I helped design and built a fully automated intake pipeline that picked up client files via SFTP on a scheduled basis. The pipeline began with a format validation layer that verified column presence, file structure, and encoding before any data processing occurred. Invalid files triggered an immediate notification to the ops team with specific guidance on what needed correction.

For files that passed format validation, the pipeline applied a configurable field mapping layer that translated client-specific column names and value formats to the internal platform schema. A data quality pass then flagged records with missing required fields, invalid values, or logical conflicts (e.g., termination date before effective date). Clean records were loaded directly to the platform database; exception records were compiled into a structured report emailed automatically to the ops team.

The ops team's role shifted from manually entering all records to reviewing only the exception report and handling edge cases. This fundamentally changed how the team's time was allocated and allowed them to work on other initiatives.