Ben Stroup

The joys of carrying a non-corporate sponsored health plan is that you get to step into the web of chaos between you (the member), the doctor’s office (the provider), and the insurance company.

After a recent “incident” that is still in the process of being resolved, I’ve learned that about the only people who can treat their clients with no respect or concern and who are largely unaccountable to anyone are insurance companies.

In some small way, I’m grateful for this nightmare. It has taught me what I should never do to my clients. Here are 10 things I’ve learned never to do to my clients:

1. Prevent the client from access to their information.
2. Create unnecessary processes.
3. Confuse the client with paperwork.
4. Make the resolution process so difficult that I hedge my bet the client will give up before the situation is resolved.
5. Refuse to disclosure the client’s information citing that I’m not required by law to do so.
6. Force the client to hire an attorney to get beyond customer service and talk to a decision maker.
7. Place the burden of resolution on the client even though they don’t have access to the information or people to resolve anything.
8. Treat the client as an interruption to my day.
9. Demand the client follow my process as a first line of defense rather than the resolution being the goal.
10. Require payment without committing to do anything.

Have you ever had an experience (not specific to insurance companies) that you use as an example of what not to do with clients? What did you learn?

Ben Stroup is a content activist in a post-paragraph world. He is chief broker of opportunity at Ben Stroup Enterprises. Connect with Ben via email, Twitter, and Google+. Subscribe via email to learn how to use content to move people to action.