Health Insurance Customer Satisfaction Reaches Record High as Humana Leads the Industry | BenefitsPRO

A new report from the American Customer Satisfaction Index (ACSI) Insurance and Health Care Study finds that consumer satisfaction with health insurance has reached an all-time high in the United States. The report, which is based on interviews with 12,849 customers between October 2022 and September 2023, indicates that satisfaction with health insurers and healthcare providers increased during this one-year period .

The data revealed that satisfaction with health insurance increased 4% to a record score of 76 (out of 100), customer engagement points such as call centers and locations Web improving 5% year over year. At the same time, hospital scores improved by 4%, reaching their highest score (74) since 2018.

For health insurance, efficiency is improving as the industry continues to adopt advanced technologies and policyholders take note, says Forrest Morgeson, associate professor of marketing at Michigan State University and director of the distinguished research at ACSI. Despite rising costs, consumers are more impressed with the quality and value of their health insurance, and the improvement extends across the entire policyholder experience, including mobile apps. On the provider side, hospitals are enjoying gains in outpatient satisfaction, while non-hospital care increases 11% as COVID-19-era restrictions on medical offices, such as mandates mask and the limits on the number of people in a care circle are lifted.

Better scores across the board

ACSI scores for customer satisfaction with their experiences with health insurance plans improved across the board. Scores for quality of customer experience with mobile apps improved from 80 to 84 between 2022 and 2023. Score for reliability of mobile apps also improved from 80 to 84 over this period. Satisfaction with access to primary care physicians improved from 77 to 81. Website satisfaction improved with the same numbers. And access to specialist doctors and hospitals increased from 76 to 80.

The report found that the ACSI score for non-hospital health care improved from 73 in 2022 to 81 in 2023; an improvement of 11%. For hospital care, the score improved from 71 to 74, a more modest but still significant improvement of 4%. By digging deeper into different areas of care, hospital outpatient care improved, from 77 to 81 between 2022 and 2023. Inpatient care scores actually fell, from 74 to 72. And emergency room care scores didn’t increased only slightly, from 66 to 67.

The failing experience of inpatient care can be attributed to a number of reasons, but staffing shortages are hard to ignore, the report says. Job openings in the sector hit a record high, while some 1,400 hospitals admitted to significant staffing shortages to the federal government last year, according to the 2023 Health Care Workforce Analysis the American Hospital Association.

Insurers generally improve their scores

The report notes that improving customer engagement points on the technology side was part of the reason insurers performed better this year. Health insurers saw widespread satisfaction gains among policyholders, with all but one provider increasing their ACSI score, the report said.

Humana was the industry leader in 2023, improving 6% to 82. Small Health Insurers Group (up 8%) and UnitedHealth (up 4%) came in second at 78, followed by Aetna , which increases by 4% to 77.

Customer satisfaction with health plans can depend on many factors, according to a June 2023 study from KFF. This report highlights that affordability can play a role, as can health status. Most insured adults (81%) give their health insurance an excellent or good overall rating, although ratings vary by health status, the report said.

The KFF report notes that when people have health problems, they tend to rate health insurers lower. And customer experience in this report was a significant issue: A majority of insured adults (58%) say they have encountered problems using their health insurance in the past 12 months, such as reimbursement requests refused, provider network problems and pre-authorization problems. the report said.

ACSI’s higher customer experience ratings may be a sign that such issues are being resolved for some consumers.