In these days of tight budgets, states are looking for every single penny they can save. Our friends in Utah are saving more than a few – 52¢ to be exact – every time they send an electronic notice to someone enrolled in Medicaid. This is one of those win-win strategies where saving money also improves customer service. After all, e-communications are almost instantaneous so no more delays in transit, which can be critical when notices about renewals or premium payments are time sensitive. And there is an added benefit that would cost a lot more if it were provided by the postal service – confirmation that the message was not only delivered to a valid address but also opened!
Through an online account called “myCase,” Medicaid and CHIP enrollees in Utah are able to accomplish a number of tasks associated with their coverage and other benefits, including going paperless and receiving e-mail and/or text messages. The electronic communication does not contain potentially confidential information but lets them know a notice has been delivered to their online account. They can login to read the notice, which can be viewed and printed for up to six months. If you’d like to see how myCase works, check out this demo.
The Utah Department of Workforce Services (DWS), the agency that administers eligibility for the state’s medical and other benefit programs, launched myCase late last year. Initially, the agency did not promote it to enrollees while they made the tweaks and refinements that are inevitably needed when any new system is rolled out. This month, DWS sent out a flyer letting enrollees know what they can do by registering for myCase, which includes this broad list of functions:
* Going paperless
* Checking benefit status
* Viewing application status
* Viewing EBT (food assistance) balance
* Checking to see if DWS received verifications they sent
* Viewing notices and printing forms
* Reporting changes
* Signing-up for eAlerts
* Chatting online or searching frequently asked questions
* Renewing benefits (coming soon!)
Utah serves more than 185,000 families who receive health and other benefits. DWS estimates that it will save more than $12 per year for every family that opts for e-communications. Based on the state’s experience with e-communications in its Unemployment Insurance (UI) Division, participation will be high. Less than a year after launching UI e-communications nearly half of beneficiaries overall and approximately 95% of new unemployment claimants had opted to receive electronic notices. While both the UI system and myCase allow individuals to opt-out at any time, which triggers the state mailing paper notices again, only 1% of UI beneficiaries have done so.
It’s a little early to predict the overall success and savings but I’m betting it’s enough to fill a lot of piggy banks. If half of the families opt for e-communications, there will be $1.125 million dollars in savings, not all of which accrues to the state since it splits administrative costs for federal programs. But consider if this was reinvested in children’s health coverage, where the state gets 72¢ from the federal government when it spends 28¢ on kids’ coverage. According to my math, the state’s share of the savings (based on a conservative 50%-50% split on administrative costs) is enough to provide health care coverage for at least 787 more uninsured Utah children for a full year. Now that’s a penny well spent!
