{"id":29581,"date":"2021-11-16T00:00:00","date_gmt":"2021-11-16T05:00:00","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ourpublicservice.org\/medicare-customer-support-services\/"},"modified":"2022-11-15T10:28:00","modified_gmt":"2022-11-15T15:28:00","slug":"medicare-customer-support-services","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/ourpublicservice.org\/our-solutions\/customer-experience\/y2021\/medicare-customer-support-services\/","title":{"rendered":"Medicare Customer Support Services"},"content":{"rendered":"\n
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\n<\/i>Back to Customer Experience Profiles<\/span><\/a>\n\n\n\n
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Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, Department of Health and Human Services<\/h2>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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Executive Summary<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Data Highlights<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>Customer Experience Insights<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

<\/a>Delivering Services Equitably<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Leading Customer Experience Practices<\/a><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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Medicare provides health care coverage to more than 63 million people and offers services to help customers understand this coverage and empower future customers to make informed decisions about which Medicare plan is right for them. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

Medicare enrollees and those looking to enroll report high satisfaction with the service they receive when calling Medicare, and new online tools are helping make the agency\u2019s website clearer and easier to navigate. Despite these successes, customers who are new to Medicare can struggle to navigate the service options available. To address the needs of these new customers, the agency redesigned the section of its website that offers information specifically for new customers and piloted a free \u201cconcierge service\u201d to offer more in-depth support when these customers call Medicare. <\/p>\n\n\n\n

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Service Overview<\/strong><\/h5>\n\n\n\n

Primary\u202fcustomers<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

Individuals enrolled or seeking to enroll in Medicare, and their caregivers.\u202f\u202f<\/p>\n\n\n\n

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  • 63.3 million people<\/strong> were enrolled in Medicare as of September 2021.\u202f<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

    Key services provided to customers<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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    • Answers to questions about medical services, tests and drugs covered by Medicare.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Help with understanding coverage options and shopping for, comparing, and enrolling in Medicare health plans, Medicare prescription drug plans or both.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Information about Medicare premiums.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Assistance with finding and comparing Medicare health care providers.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Assistance with coordinating Medicare benefits.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
    • Information and answers to questions about claims and payments.\u202f\u202f<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n\n\n\n

      Service Snapshot (all data for fiscal year 2020)<\/strong><\/p>\n\n\n\n

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      • 24 million<\/strong>calls<\/strong> to contact center.\n
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        • Average wait time: about 5 minutes<\/strong>.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/li>\n\n\n\n
        • 1.4 million<\/strong> webchats<\/strong> between the agency and customers.<\/li>\n\n\n\n
        • 43 million<\/strong> users<\/strong> of Medicare.gov.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n
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          Data Highlights<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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          point increase in customer satisfaction with Medicare.gov among customers who are new to Medicare (from January to August 2021).<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div><\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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          of callers who participated in a pilot of Medicare\u2019s free \u201cconcierge service\u201d were satisfied with the service.<\/strong><\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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          Customer Experience Insights<\/h2>\n\n\n\n
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          Improvement from last year<\/p>\n<\/div>\n\n\n\n

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          Room for improvement<\/p>\n<\/div>\n<\/div>\n\n\n

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          In 2020, Medicare combined and improved several search tools to make it easier for customers to find health care providers who accept Medicare.<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t
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          In late 2020, the agency launched a new Care Compare tool on Medicare.gov that is optimized for mobile devices. It enables customers to easily search for the type of care they are seeking and narrow down results to find the provider best match. This new feature combines several previous search tools that had been confusing to customers: before that, they would have to know exactly what type of care they were looking for and the specific technical term Medicare uses to describe it. The new tool enables customers to search by location, key words or phrases and includes improved filters and maps of provider locations, making it easier for customers to find the provider that is right for them. The tool also includes additional resources to help customers make decisions; for example, customers searching for a nursing home can see a checklist with common questions and considerations to help them evaluate their options.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t<\/div>\r\n\t

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          Customers new to Medicare can find it difficult to navigate the service options available.<\/div>\r\n\t\t\t
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          The process of enrolling in Medicare for the first time can be complicated for customers who must make several important decisions about the type and timing of coverage they want. Medicare\u2019s customer research shows that these \u201cnew to Medicare\u201d customers do not have as smooth an experience with Medicare services as existing customers and may need extra support. To address this gap, the agency recently redesigned the \u201cGet Started with Medicare\u201d section of Medicare.gov to help new customers more easily find the information they need to make decisions about their coverage. Medicare also improved its Initial Enrollment Period package to lay out more clearly the actions new customers must take when enrolling and partnered with the Social Security Administration to send personalized emails to these customers with important information they need to know during their first year enrolled in Medicare. With these changes, customer satisfaction with Medicare.gov increased by 24 points for \u201cnew to Medicare\u201d customers between January and August 2021.<\/p>\n

          This year the agency also piloted free \u201cconcierge service\u201d to offer more in-depth assistance to new customers calling 1-800-Medicare. For customers who accepted, call center representatives scheduled a follow-up call and noted any questions or topics the customer would like to discuss. Specialized call center representatives then returned the customer\u2019s call at the scheduled time to talk through their specific questions. To ensure customers had the information they needed, representatives also offered to follow up after the call with a letter detailing the topics discussed and the next actions the customer needed to take. In survey data Medicare collected, 97% of callers who participated in the pilot were satisfied with the concierge service.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t<\/div>\r\n\t

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          <\/i><\/span> Online accounts could make it easier for caregivers to help manage benefits for people with Medicare. <\/div>\r\n\t\t\t
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          Some people get help from caregivers in managing their Medicare benefits\u2014whether family members or aides, nurses or other professionals. It can be hard for caregivers to access claims information and health care records on Medicare.gov, since only a Medicare beneficiary can set up an account on the site. In the future, CMS plans to add an option for caregivers to create their own accounts that link to the information for those they assist\u2014potentially enabling them to manage benefits for multiple people (e.g., both their parents) with one login.<\/p>\n\t\t<\/div>\r\n\t<\/div>\r\n<\/div>\r\n\r\n