Reaction to UHC stores: People aren't saying “I love my health insurance company – let me see what else I can buy from them'
UnitedHealthCare will be directed to consumers with its new online digital shopping experience. While some healthcare leaders say this opens up another source of income for UnitedHealthcare and makes access to health care more seamless, others are more skeptical.
Last week, the health insurance behemoth Announced the launch of the UHC store, which is available in the UnitedHealthCare app and its website. Members are able to purchase a range of health and wellness products for up to 15% off. Insurers will open UHC stores in phases, starting with 6 million insurance members, and plans to expand it to 18 million business members later this year.
These products include weight loss programs, orthopedic management applications and women's health resources. UnitedHealthCare is working with more than 25 UHC stores and plans to expand further. Current partners include Cylinders of Digestive Health Company, Chronic Condition Management Platform DarioHealth, Women's Health Brand Embrs Labs, Weight Management Service Nutrition, Fitness Application Sworkit and Musculoskeleckelal Care Care Provider KAIA Health. For example, cylinder users can access a diet coach; nutrition customers get glucose monitors and personalized weight management support; Embr provides wearable cooling devices designed to relieve stress associated with hot flashes and menopause.
Consumers can buy these products directly at UHC stores, and recurring transactions will be handled by UnitedHealthCare. Members can pay with credit cards, Apple Pay and Google Pay.
The idea behind UHC stores is to complement the benefits offered by employers.
“The UnitedHealthCare store is indeed the first time we are committed to pushing more consumer choices into healthcare and benefit landscapes,” said Amy Jordan, vice president of consumer experience at UnitedHealthCare’s business in an interview. “We often hear from members about how they desire their own interests and want greater flexibility in their products, and we see an opportunity to bring embedded benefits to neighboring products, which is part of our experience.”
In some ways, the UHC store is similar to Amazon’s health benefits connector, which connects people to digital health plans like weight loss, mental health, diabetes, musculoskeletal care, and more. Some of its supplier partners include Teladoc, Hinge Health and Omada. However, patients can use their insurance for these plans.
For at least one healthcare professional, this new digital shopping experience from UnitedHealthCare has not added value.
“I don’t think it’s that important because you basically ask people to go and buy products they can get from the health industry elsewhere, and at the end of the day, right or wrong, most Americans may not know who their health insurance company is.
He also questioned whether UHC stores would really have a lot of cost benefits. He noted that with UnitedHealthCare Vision, he could have bought contacts at a discount, but it is still much more expensive than buying other places like Costco and Ezcontacts.
Another healthcare expert noted that this reflects a broader trend: Payers are increasingly aware of the importance of using technology to attract consumers. However, UnitedHealthcare faces increasing competition in this regard.
“UnitedHealth competes not only with other payers to influence member behavior, but also with Chatgpt,” said Seth Joseph, founder and managing director of Summit Health Advisors. “The biggest determinant of success or failure will be that the program is limited by consumer-facing technology executives with UN health company Leviathan.”
In other words, Joseph questioned whether UnitedHealthCare has legal technology and consumer experience executives. He claimed that the initiative could fail if it was led by a joint healthcare executive with minimal consumer experience. In addition, consumers are increasingly using chatgpt to research any of their own queries.
He added that he was a little skeptical of this particular initiative from UnitedHealthcare.
“UnitedHealth is a vertically integrated healthcare behemoth with core competitiveness including underwriting, risk stratification, mergers and acquisitions, and corporate elimination (or accounting practices),” he said. “What happens when those with how consumers make decisions when they are based on taps or slides right now?” He added that UnitedHealthCare is a massive bureaucratic organization with a core capability that is very different from its appeal to consumers. Technology companies that can run experiments quickly and make changes (e.g., eliminating invalid plans or technologies) can often be better suited to consumers.
At the same time, healthcare professors are less suspicious. Dr. Robert Pearl, former CEO of Permanente Medical Group, is currently a professor at Stanford School of Medicine and Stanford Business School, said it appears to be a low-cost opportunity for insurers to get some extra income.
“I think it’s basically a support tool [for] Membership reserved, [with] “Get some profit from the transaction. I think that's their ability to expand the definition of an insurance company,” he said.
However, according to UnitedHealthcare, this is just one way to provide members with more choices for health support.
“We also hope it helps drive engagement with our digital tools, which is a key strategy as we are thinking about how we can really help improve and make health care systems work better and easier for everyone,” Jordan said. “We are focusing on investing heavily in our digital experiences to try and provide tools and resources to make it easier for members to browse the complexity of the health care landscape.”
Perhaps, if the company is able to build a closer connection with consumers, this could help change people’s perception of the health insurance industry as a whole, whose reputation has been hurt by understanding or wrong perceptions – they will delay or refuse care.
Image source: Jungleoutthere, Getty Images
