Hi everyone. Here is an update on this partnership that we’re very excited to share.
As most of you know who have worked with us for any amount of time, we have created a unique partnership with First Stop Health which allows businesses who normally would NOT be able to work with First Stop Health this exact opportunity.
This overall is great for several reasons. First, this is the most client-friendly approach to telemedicine that we’ve ever seen. Where most telemedicine providers charge low fees, the big guys out there (we won’t name any names) tend to nickel and dime our clients when employees start using the service. I personally don’t understand that. I thought the point was to use these types of services to provide convenience and savings to employees and employers alike.
Apparently, not in their eyes.
After seeing this year after year from these providers, this led us on a long journey to find a new, better way. I couldn’t stand by and be a partner in this gamesmanship. Our good friend Dr. Bricker (formerly of Compass PHS fame) introduced us to First Stop Health. It took a few months but late last summer, we came to an agreement where we (HBC) would manage the setup and administration for our small business clients internally in exchange for FSH allowing us to add small businesses into their system. This took some work and some back and forth, but it has turned into a great partnership for us, and hopefully, they feel the same way. I am sure if they didn’t, they would tell us.😊
Second, one other thing we LOVE about FSH is their communication strategy and their guarantees. They send constant campaigns and reach outs to their members to remind them that the service is in place. For their directly written large groups (not the HBC Umbrella small groups), they have guarantees on the table that state if they don’t hit a certain utilization minimum requirement, they will refund some of the program’s costs that were paid over the course of the contract period. I find this to be absolutely amazing and have not seen this from anyone else. This is unique, and it shows their true devotion to serving those who hire them. Absolutely LOVE this!
That above and beyond effort by them is amazing. Most vendors in this space, and most brokers and agencies, for that matter, don’t want to work with small businesses, and I get it. A lot are unorganized and are difficult to deal with or get a hold of, but that’s not exclusive to small businesses. We feel differently about the matter as we want to see small businesses compete with larger ones (talent and business-wise), so we will always do our absolute best to try and help small businesses as much as we can. I would be lying if I told you we didn’t have companies that we can’t get to pick up the phone or answer emails that we work with, but the majority are very happy that we are here handling all of their back office HR administration and realize the value of this added service. We are also always looking for vendors we can bring to the table for our small business partners, and FSH has turned into one of our favorites.
Last but not least, by any means, and this would be for those who may have looked at FSH in the past or who have already jumped in, we hit a membership threshold with them at the beginning of the year, so the monthly rates which were already lower than most other telemedicine providers dropped even further. For those who were already on board, we went ahead and lowered the monthly cost for you. This isn’t something we make money on, it’s a service we believe in so we want to pass the savings on immediately and not wait until your “renewal.” For those who had previously considered FSH but didn’t act, costs are now about $2 lower per employee per month than last year when we first rolled out the program.
I know that’s a lot of information about a single telemedicine provider, but we are excited to have this be the first program that we’ve helped build and also about all of the positive changes that have happened with FSH in a relatively short time.
Thanks so much for reading! We look forward to talking soon. Anything we can help with, please let us know.
