Momentum Health: Fit for the future
Momentum Health is quickly positioning itself within the upper tier of open medical schemes in South Africa after producing yet another enviable set of financial results for 2011. Despite increasing healthcare costs and economic uncertainty, the Scheme ha
The Scheme’s solvency level has also vastly improved and is currently sitting at 24%, well ahead of its business plan to reach 25% by 2015, as agreed with the Council for Medical Schemes. The Scheme’s strong position was recently reaffirmed by the Global Credit Rating Company (GCR), an independent risk rating group, which awarded Momentum Health an A+ rating for the eighth consecutive year.
“We have worked hard to grow the right member profile and improve our customer satisfaction levels, while continuing to provide flexible, relevant healthcare products that speak to today’s diverse market,” says Damian McHugh, Head of Marketing and Sales for Momentum Health. “We have also reduced our total non-healthcare costs to 15%, without compromising the quality of service and care for our members.”
The effect is that the Scheme is growing steadily, “Growth is essential but should not be at the cost of an increased average age,” said McHugh. “One of the truest determinants of future claims costs in a medical scheme is its age, and if that’s getting older it means that the scheme’s claims costs are going to increase in real terms. Momentum Health’s average member age has gone down by three years from 46 to 43 in the last five years – the lowest amongst the top ten open schemes in the country – and our claims ratio has seen a similar positive improvement.”
Service levels in the Scheme’s call centres have also increased dramatically and a dedicated service recovery team has been put in place to ensure that complaints are dealt with promptly and seamlessly, all whilst serving as opportunities to improve future processes.
Momentum was recently announced the winner of the 9th Annual PMR National Administrators survey, and its customer satisfaction index has returned a satisfaction level in excess of 90% since June 2011. This accolade is further proof of the Scheme’s success in offering members service delivery of the highest standard.
“We’re very proud of our service delivery. We’ve been able to very successfully improve our claim turnaround times to an average of only 1.3 days, while also ensuring an increase in claims quality,” said McHugh.
“Our financial results are very good, we’ve got some of the best service levels in the industry and our product range offers choice and flexibility, resulting in growth with the right member profile. With these three factors in harmony, the outlook for the Scheme is extremely promising.”
