SBK publishes customer feedback

09.12.2016 17:16

The Siemens company health insurance company (SBK) wants to learn from customer feedback and is now communicating this to the outside world. With this, the SBK wants to take a step towards greater transparency in statutory health insurance (GKV). “Good cash registers can be measured by customer ratings,” says Dr. Hans Unterhuber, CEO of SBK.

In 2016, SBK said it received 3,836 complaints from customers. In relation to the number of insured people of 1,045,117 (as of September 30, 2016), this means a complaint rate of 0.37 percent, according to the health insurance company. In the previous year, SBK customers submitted a total of 4,150 complaints, which meant a rate of around 0.40 percent. In 75 percent of cases, complainants received personal response to their concerns within 24 hours.

The SBK defines the term complaint very broadly: even unsubscribing from the customer magazine is recorded as a complaint. It is up to you whether statutory health insurance companies systematically record your complaints and how they deal with them.

A total of 660 objections were submitted to the SBK in 2015 (542 objections from the area of health insurance and 118 objections from the area of nursing care insurance). In 2015, 547 objections were discussed in the Appeals Committee: In 540 cases, i.e. almost 99 percent of the cases, the SBK's decision also withstood another independent review by the Appeals Committee.

175 lawsuits before social courts

Customers who do not accept an objection notice can go to the social court. In 2015, SBK customers did this in 175 cases. Together with pending cases from previous years, 213 lawsuits were ended. According to their own information, the courts ruled in favor of the SBK in 75 percent of the proceedings, and a further 12 percent were concluded through settlement. In 12 percent, the courts decided in favor of the plaintiffs.

SBK calls for more transparency in the GKV

The SBK calls on all statutory health insurance companies to deal transparently with such key figures. “We have to consistently focus on the customer – that means dealing openly with uncomfortable feedback.” Customer satisfaction figures are also relevant to competition and provide information about the quality of a health insurance company.