Skip to main content

eHealthInsurance.com

A few days ago, I received in U.S. Mail a notice from UniCare that the premiums on my health insurance were going up. Given that my health plan covers little and now is going to cost more than twice as much as it did four years ago, I decided to research other options.

I originally signed up for my health insurance plan through eHealthInsurance.com, a helpful service that enabled me to browse and compare numerous plans from a number of different providers. At the site, you can specify various plan features (deductible, co-pay, etc.), view a list of plans that satisfy those parameters, and compare the plan details.

It's a great concept. Unfortunately, it has nonetheless frustrated me. The reason is that the service focuses on the features of health insurance plans rather than addressing real-world scenarios.

This morning, I went to eHealthInsurance.com to research alternatives to my existing plan. I brought up various plans but scratched my head when trying to determine what they would and wouldn't cover. So I called their customer service to speak to a health insurance "agent".

The agent immediately asked me what I wanted in a plan. I told her that I don't know and suggested we walk through various scenarios and see which plans best covered them.
  1. I get into a car wreck, suffer massive internal injuries, and go to the hospital for surgery.
  2. I get a minor cut on my leg and go to a minor emergency center for stitches.
  3. I go to the doctor for a routine check-up.
  4. I go to the doctor to get a prostate exam (leaving aside the fact that the one prostate exam I've received was the most unpleasant experience in my entire life).
The agent's response? "I don't have time to go through all that. Just tell me what you want," she replied. "Do you want a co-pay?"

At this point, I told her I was frustrated. She was assuming I was an expert on health insurance concepts. All I know is that there are various types of scenarios. Some plans address them well, and others don't. Co-pays, deductibles, co-insurance, and out-of-pocket limits mean nothing to me except insofar as they affect the bottom line in these types of scenarios.

Though she initially refused to walk through the scenarios with me, she effectively did by the end of the conversation. I felt educated enough to compare plans and make a decision. Despite the fact I was still seething with frustration, I thanked her for her patience.

What product management lessons does this experience teach? I'll examine some of them in a future entry.

Comments

Michael said…
I have to but my own health insurance too, which is a royal pain in the ass.

I use these guys (http://txinsurance.com/) and they are awesome. I've called the agent up to ask him all sorts of questions and he's always hella nice. It's not a mega company, he's just an agent, and, most important, a human, not a pile of flesh with a phone attached to their ear and script in front on their face ;)
Sat Sep 08, 10:12:00 PM 2007
Anonymous said…
You should always deal with your local health insurance agent. Big companies do not care about your health insurance needs, they are only out to sell you a health insurance plan. When you deal with a health agent they take the time to go over your health care needs as well as your budget. I bought my California health insurance through: http://www.insurancebydave.com
Tue Feb 03, 05:57:00 PM 2009
Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Why Spreadsheets Suck for Prioritizing

The Goal As a company executive, you want confidence that your product team (which includes all the people, from all departments, responsible for product success) has a sound basis for deciding which items are on the product roadmap. You also want confidence the team is prioritizing the items in a smart way. What Should We Prioritize? The items the team prioritizes could be features, user stories, epics, market problems, themes, or experiments. Melissa Perri  makes an excellent case for a " problem roadmap ", and, in general, I recommend focusing on the latter types of items. However, the topic of what types of items you should prioritize - and in what situations - is interesting and important but beyond the scope of this blog entry. A Sad but Familiar Story If there is significant controversy about priorities, then almost inevitably, a product manager or other member of the team decides to put together The Spreadsheet. I've done it. Some of the mos
32 comments
Read more

5 Ways Companies Make Product Decisions

In the last blog entry, we reviewed the  four problems that companies face, or are trying to overcome, as they make product decisions .  Now we'll look at the ways that most companies make their product decisions. Companies that develop, market, and sell products and solutions make strategic and ongoing tactical decisions.  They decide what features to include in their products, what messages they will use to communicate the value of their products, what marketing tactics they will use, what prospective customers they will target, and many day-to-day choices. Whether or not these decisions are deliberate or ad hoc, most companies use some combination of the following ways of making product decisions. (A downloadable "map" that summarizes the product decision landscape is included at the end of this article.) Customer Wants Product decisions based on feature requests, focus groups, and what prospects and customers say they want. Companies are selling products to
12 comments
Read more

Is Customer Development Pseudoscience?

The “Science” of Lean Startup Lean startup practitioners embrace the scientific method, seeking the "truth" about what business model and strategy will lead to product success. We do so by: Formulating hypotheses Crafting and running experiments to test them Learning from the experiments Iteratively feeding our learnings back into revised hypotheses Sounds pretty scientific, at least in spirit, doesn't it? Yet this process actually neglects a key ingredient in the scientists' mode of operation. To identify what’s missing, let’s examine “customer development”. Customer Development Steve Blank is one of the pioneers of the lean startup movement. He introduced into the lean startup lexicon the term “customer development”. Customer development consists of sessions and interactions with customers to test hypotheses. For example, a product manager might interview a prospect, asking if she agrees with the product manager’s hypotheses about the problem
9 comments
Read more