I had a bit of a frustrating experience getting my elderly parents signed up for a jab today.
They are patients of a local hospital conglomerate. (I realize that’s typical in the States, Kaiser et al., but I’ve been living in Ontario, where you’re not wedded to some particular chain.) The hospital system said they’d notify patients who qualify, which both of my parents do, in spades. Dad was just in the ICU, during the pandemic, thought not for COVID.
Now, how did they choose to notify people? Well, how would you choose to notify elderly patients? A phone call, right? Perhaps a letter in the mail? Maybe a text?
Ha. No. They are apparently notifying people…through their patient portal app. No push notifications. No email notifications. The message just appears in your inbox, and it’s up to you to find it.
Which is, you know, less than optimal for the patients in these 1a and 1b vaccine groups. You know what a lot of elderly people aren’t great at? Constantly checking an app to see if they got a message.
Of course, for all I know, they may have other methods to contact people. But do they communicate those methods anywhere? No.
Ugh. I know. This is all complicated and rolling out at record speed. I get it. The logistics of this whole mess are horrifying. But just the teeniest bit of information and UX design here would got a long ways.
How can it be worse? Well, you can not have insurance, but you already knew that one. You can have an insurance company that's poorly integrated with providers, resulting in "edge cases" that somehow always involve you paying more. A lot more. Here's the one affecting me, though: insurance companies use pricing to ensure that my employer picks a new plan every year, which always has an extremely decrepit sign-up process every year, which no doubt shakes some fraction of the generally young and healthy workforce from going through it at all. It usually takes hours, even for someone of my technical aptitude, because you have to go on a scavenger hunt for the correct links, ID numbers, and codes.
It's not bad UX, it's brilliant UX, but the masters it servers are... not us.
> Here's the one affecting me: insurance companies use pricing to ensure that my employer picks a new plan every year, which always has an extremely decrepit sign-up process every year, which no doubt shakes some fraction of the workforce from going through it at all.
That's probably not the insurer’s intent, since it's in their interest to have the most people possible enrolled.
People who elect the benefit but don't complete the signup process are still enrolled, they just can't consume the services until they run the gauntlet, discouraging service use and increasing profit.
Under the ACA Medical Loss Ratio rule, insurers must refund premiums if they exceed a certain percentage of reimbursed costs across a plan (there's a couple different tiers with different limits.)
In order to maximize profits, they need maximum utilization, which takes completing the signup, not just idle premium payment.
Eh, I've seen accounting rules of that sort worked around with relative ease. It's not difficult to find ways to spend money that send value back your way, and even when you're in that position it's always the right move to ask for more. Budgeting incentives 101.
To be fair, communicating medical information through some channels is illegal due to privacy/security concerns. However I know that Kaiser in particular does actually email you to say "you have a message", even though it won't say what that message is.
When you're at the hospital, you might be able to pop by the administration office to make sure that the email they have for you is correct... you know, for when the next pandemic comes and you have this problem again.
They are patients of a local hospital conglomerate. (I realize that’s typical in the States, Kaiser et al., but I’ve been living in Ontario, where you’re not wedded to some particular chain.) The hospital system said they’d notify patients who qualify, which both of my parents do, in spades. Dad was just in the ICU, during the pandemic, thought not for COVID.
Now, how did they choose to notify people? Well, how would you choose to notify elderly patients? A phone call, right? Perhaps a letter in the mail? Maybe a text?
Ha. No. They are apparently notifying people…through their patient portal app. No push notifications. No email notifications. The message just appears in your inbox, and it’s up to you to find it.
Which is, you know, less than optimal for the patients in these 1a and 1b vaccine groups. You know what a lot of elderly people aren’t great at? Constantly checking an app to see if they got a message.
Of course, for all I know, they may have other methods to contact people. But do they communicate those methods anywhere? No.
Ugh. I know. This is all complicated and rolling out at record speed. I get it. The logistics of this whole mess are horrifying. But just the teeniest bit of information and UX design here would got a long ways.