Big healthcare insurers are doing some things right to build websites that customers like. But in general the nation’s biggest healthcare carriers still have a long way to go to make their websites as easy to use as those in retail, financial services and other industries, says new research from Corporate Insight.

In its latest digital healthcare survey and evaluation, financial services and consulting firm Corporate Insight asked about 700 consumers to rate the digital healthcare capabilities of 11 big healthcare carriers: Aetna Inc., Anthem Inc., Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois, Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts, CareFirst Inc., Cigna, Empire Blue Cross and Blue Shield, Harvard Pilgrim Health Care Inc., Humana Inc., Kaiser Permanente and UnitedHealth Group.

Corporate Insight found that 64% of 685 users rated themselves as “very satisfied” or “extremely satisfied” with their experience at the websites of big health insurers in the last 12 months. But those ratings are substantially lower than for other types of financial service companies. For example 91% and 90%, respectively, of customers using the websites and online tools of a brokerage firm or bank site categorized their experience as “very satisfied” or “extremely satisfied.” No commercial insurer website received a “good” rating from consumers, while 5 of 17 brokerage firms did.

“The health insurance industry has substantial work to do in terms of improving its member-focused websites and making these more user-friendly,” says Corporate Insight analyst Johanna Hife.

Consumers want to interact with health insurers online—68% of users indicated that having access to their carrier’s website was “very or extremely important.” But the web user  experience in healthcare is not as good compared to other financial services companies, says Corporate Insight.

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“Insurers have added online resources in the past few years, but many are dated and suffer from usability issues,” Hife says. “For example, members are still required to fax or mail claim forms instead of sending them online, and half of the firms in our coverage set offer online pharmacies, but most of these are limited to prescription refills and don’t allow new prescription requests or renewals.”

Many big health insurers also lack the connections to a healthcare providers’ computer and web systems that would enable patients to do more transactions online, such as scheduling a doctor visit.  “Plans fail to integrate logical follow-up actions in doctor locator tools—once members zero in on a few healthcare providers, they are not able to see a physician’s open time slots or to schedule an appointment online.” Hife says.

The top reasons consumers use a health insurance website are to access health plan information (82%), view plan and account balances (79%) view claims information and enroll  in health plan (77%). Some health carriers do offer specific features and functions that consumers rate highly. They include:

  • Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Massachusetts for web tools that give customers easy and convenient ways to find coverage and benefit details.
  • UnitedHealth for features that display claims detail.
  • CareFirst for tools that give plan members quick and easy access to deductible and out-of-pocket costs information.
  • The Blue Cross plans in Illinois and Massachusetts for good and intuitive provider locater and cost estimator tools.
  • Anthem, Cigna and Empire Blue Cross for tools that let patients and plan members access personal medical records and health histories.

While some health insurers offer features that click with consumers, as a group healthcare carriers still have heir work cut out building out web and e-commerce sites that are as good as sites from other retail and financial services companies, says Corporate Insight. “The health insurance industry has been slow to adapt to the digitization trend and lags behind more digital-forward, customer-focused industries in offering user-friendly online resources,” Hife says. “Until recently, health insurers have had little incentive to offer modern, robust digital platforms, but things are beginning to change.”

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In order to keep rising healthcare costs in check, more insurers are giving plan members via their employers access to online preventive health and wellness programs tied to loyalty programs that reward employees for losing weight or getting in shape. More big health insurers also will continue to make their website features and functions more consumer-friendly because that is how plan members, especially younger members, want to research, buy and manage their coverage, Hife says.

“Insurers are paying closer attention to millennials and Gen Xers, who comprise nearly half of the U.S. population and whose tech-savviness has transformed the way businesses serve consumers,” she says.

 

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