Norwich Union's HR department has rolled out a search application to make it easier for staff to find out about employment policies themselves.

The application allows staff to get information about straightforward policies, such as holiday allowance, pay conditions and absence.

At time of publishing, more than 17,600 of the insurance giant's 35,000 employees have accessed the AskHR system, supplied by Transversal, over 51,000 times.

The system has been so successful, Norwich Union will roll it out to its RAC subsidiary by the end of the year. Norwich Union head of HR advice services Catherine Tausney expects headcount allocated to advising staff on these sorts of issues to be reduced by 30 per cent by the middle of next year.

She told silicon.com: "The system turned out to be much more successful than we imagined. We didn't expect staff to adopt the application so readily."

Staff normally assigned to manning the staff helpline can now be reassigned to the managers helpdesk, which deals with complex issues and requires advice rather than straightforward answers.

Tausney said: "The core business advantage is it makes it easier for staff to work at Norwich Union. People get a speedier answer to their questions. Individuals normally ask their peers about these sorts of issues first, before they go to HR, so the application cuts down on potential staff disruption too."

Describing the decision to implement the system as a 'no-brainer', Tausney said the system should give a return on investment by June 2008.