July 2, 2025
Seneca News
Speeding up workflow with AI solutions
Seneca and Acclaim Ability Management Inc. create a processing system to improve efficiency
It’s easy to understand information overload.
But what do you do if you have to manually deal with a large number of different documents, while looking for very specific details?
That was the situation facing Acclaim Ability Management Inc., a national disability management service provider, headquartered in Toronto and Sudbury. The company, which works with employers and employees to manage non-occupational workplace absences due to illness, injury or disability, approached Seneca Polytechnic looking for a way to streamline their workflow.
They teamed up with Applied Research to find a solution.
Viji Angamuthu, Principal Investigator, worked with two research assistants and Acclaim over four months to create an automated system, using AI technology, to tackle the issue.
“When we started, we thought it would be an easy project to handle, but once we began working with the dataset, we encountered different edge cases,” said Ms. Angamuthu, who is also a professor with the School of Software Design & Data Science and the School of Management and HR.
Not only does Acclaim receive a wide range of documents from emails, attachments, digital uploads and faxes, but they’re in different languages. For this project, that meant primarily dealing with English and French. In addition, because the material includes medical information, claims and legal forms, it has to be handled with meticulous care and attention.
Ms. Angamuthu said the team used advanced text recognition and data extraction techniques to begin the project. Then they used open-source technologies like Donut (Document Understanding Transformer), which analyzes document images so it can accurately interpret different languages and formats.
The end result is a system, which can be scaled, refined and retrained as more documents become available.
Research assistants Kannav Sethi, a fourth-year student in the Bachelor of Software Engineering program and Luis Agreda, who graduated with a diploma in Computer Programming in April, played key roles in the work.
The Seneca group met every week with Acclaim’s team, which included: Alana Hodge, Technical Lead; Rehana Alli, Director of Data and Analytics; and Tania Fuschino, Chief Strategy and Innovation Officer.
“The students did a great job brainstorming and tackling problems and they were excellent at communicating,” Ms. Hodge said. “They knew what they were doing and were able to look outside of the box to see what needed to be done.
“The students built the model we now have,” she said, noting it’s in the process of being integrated into Acclaim’s workflow. The plan is to start using it on a trial basis in the fall or winter.
“I’m excited to see it fleshed out so the team can use it,” Ms. Hodge said, adding it should ease their workflow considerably and will ultimately set the stage for further innovation.
Acclaim and Seneca said the project was a great success and they are in talks about future projects.
Meanwhile, Mr. Sethi has started a summer internship as a Data Scientist and AI Engineer with Acclaim.
He previously did two co-ops through his Seneca program. And he called his research project experience next level.
“It was the first time I built something from end-to-end,” Mr. Sethi said. “It was really exciting … a lot of work, but amazing.”
He said he was surprised and thrilled when the company asked him to do more work with them this summer.
Ms. Angamuthu was also pleased with how everything worked out.
“I want my students to get jobs.
“Hands-on projects like this are incredibly valuable, as they provide a learning and development opportunity for everyone involved, while also offering practical solutions to real-time issues faced by companies and organizations,” she said.
