After working for and supporting healthcare companies for more than 12 years, I understand the industry’s desire and need to reduce administrative costs. The line item that usually stands out is customer communications, especiallyprint and mail costs. After seeing that dollar amount, it’s a natural progression for healthcare companies to want to push customers to digital – “Let’s send communications to the inbox rather than the mailbox, drive them to the company’s website, develop a mobile app!” – all in an effort to save money. But what about the customer experience?
Enhancing the Digital Experience
With only 19% of consumers receiving their healthcare communications digitally1, it’s important to examine the digital experience. Often, payers and providers email their customers, notifying them that a communication is available on their website. This is a critical point in the customer experience. Does the customer want to take the time to follow the link, remember yet another username and password, and navigate through the site to determine what the communication entails? In many cases, they don’t – and they won’t. This experience could pass as acceptable for routine communications (perhaps even regulatory ones) if there are no negative impacts should the customer not review them; however, when communications require the customer to take action, such as paying a patient statement or premium invoice, this is when the digital ROI breaks down.
Getting customers to adopt digital communications requires giving them an enhanced experience – and not forcing them to go digital. Take Explanation of Benefits (EOBs) as an example. Encouraging customers on a PPO plan to review their EOB is difficult because the extent of their responsibility often ends at their co-pay. However, isn’t this a prime opportunity to enhance the communication and enable the customer to see what the provider billed the insurer? Mistakes are made by the best medical billers; chances are the cost of unchecked mistakes is more than the savings of your typical digital delivery. This is an opportunity to enhance the experience so EOBs are more likely to be read, regardless of the channel.
Leveraging Online Banking
Bills represent a significant communication expense, and getting customers to sign up for auto-drafts and paperless delivery can be challenging (especially if the digital experience is lacking as previously mentioned). Healthcare companies can grow digital adoption and accelerate payments by leveraging online banking. In fact, 80% of consumers would prefer to pay their bills via their bank’s website or app2 and 65% are more likely to pay their bills faster when they receive them in their preferred channel.3 When I compare these stats to the 19% of consumers who receive their healthcare communications digitally, it leads me to think it’s because the digital experience is simply better: the bill is delivered to the consumer’s banking account, they get an immediate notification with a direct link to take action (i.e., pay), and they are presented with a summary bill that links to a secure site with the full bill details (where the PHI is located). Online banking also eliminates the expensive credit/debit card fees payers and providers incur when offering payments via their websites. This is an untapped area for healthcare companies, and it’s one to consider given digital aspirations.
Getting Smart with Print
Beyond digital communications, there are ways healthcare companies can enhance the print experience with minimal cost impacts. The majority of patients receive 1-2 sheets of paper with extra white space on the reverse of the second page. Plus, the envelope isn’t always filled to the next ounce to maximize the postage spend. This untapped space – on the actual document and in the envelope – could be used for customer-specific messaging (e.g., FAQs, fee explanations, appointment reminders, wellness tips, etc.). Adding an extra page may cost a penny or two, but it can reduce the amount of calls to the call center, especially if you proactively address what is driving those expensive calls. The data collection effort doesn’t have to be complicated in order to be beneficial. If you are responsible for customer communications, make sure you partner with the person responsible for the call center. Simply adding a few quick note options in the CRM tool can provide the necessary information to improve communications and reduce future calls.
While you are collecting call center data, it’s also a good time to have your call center representatives ask if the customer’s contact information is current. This step can help healthcare companies avoid the top three impacts from incorrect, incomplete, or outdated contact information: delayed payments (65%); elevated returned or undeliverable mail (53%); and increased call center volumes (31%).4 Insurers with federal or state exchange customers should also ensure their customers understand they have to update their contact information via the exchange in order for the update to be passed to the insurer.
Cutting Postal Costs
Managing the reduction of returned mail is another potential cost savings opportunity. Consider this: U.S. companies incur approximately $20 billion a year for undeliverable mail due to incorrect, incomplete or illegible addresses.5 Ensure your print/mail vendor is supplying you with USPS Move Update information and advising where you measure up to the threshold. If you surpass it, penalties can be substantial – and the USPS is now enforcing the threshold with greater frequency and urgency. Beyond penalties, the cost to process returned mail, call the customer for updated information, and resend the mail can be significant – not to mention the cost of delaying the delivery of the original statement or bill.
Bringing It All Together
Improving customer communications often requires a mind shift from reducing costs to investing wisely. Administrative spend reductions should include an evaluation of the potential cause and effect those decisions have outside of your cost center, and always be done in concert with your customer retention and experience goals.
As Vice President of Heath Solutions at Broadridge Customer Communications, Jeremy Urbas is dedicated to member and patient print and digital communication strategy and program implementations. Prior to joining Broadridge in 2017, Jeremy lead enterprise communication services for Blue Cross Blue Shield of North Carolina.
About Broadridge: Broadridge, a global fintech leader with $4 billion in revenue, provides communications, technology, data and analytics. We help drive business transformation for our clients with solutions for enriching client engagement, navigating risk, optimizing efficiency and generating revenue growth. Reaching 80 percent of North American mailboxes with essential communications on behalf of more than 5,000 brands, we are uniquely positioned to drive innovation and help clients get ahead of today’s challenges and capitalize on what’s next.
References
1. Annual State of Transactional Communications: Consumer Survey, Keypoint Intelligence – InfoTrends 2018
2. Exploring the Future of Household Bill Payments, Keypoint Intelligence-InfoTrends, 2016
3. Annual State of Transactional Communications: Consumer Survey, Keypoint Intelligence – InfoTrends 2018
4. Annual State of Transactional Communications Business Survey, Keypoint Intelligence-InfoTrends, 2017
5. Source: https://www.uspsoig.gov/tags/undeliverable-mail)
