CoverUS Joins Forces with HealthNow to Accelerate Mission to Improve Access to Health Care

CoverUS Payments to launch in US in Q3 2022

11 May 2022

Today we are excited to announce that CoverUS has joined forces with New Zealand’s HealthNow, a payments innovator in helping people afford their care. In April HealthNow acquired CoverUS in an asset transaction, and the combined company is working hard on readying HealthNow’s unique payments and health care marketplace platform for a US launch in Q3 2022. (You can read the official press release here.)

This is a potent match of compatible visions and complementary skills and technology, and together we’ll advance faster toward our goals than we could have separately.

But let’s back up for a minute. How did we get here, and what does this mean? 

At CoverUS our mission has always been to help everyone afford the healthcare they need. And in the US the affordability crisis is severe:

• Last fall 30% of Americans reported skipping care in the prior three months due to cost, with 42% concerned they’d be unable to pay for care in the next year.

• One in three Americans are skipping medications due to cost.

• Avoiding or delaying care has devastating consequences for health and the economy: over 100,000 preventable deaths each year, 10% of all hospitalizations, and hundreds of billions in lost industry revenue.

• Medical debt is the top cause of bankruptcy in the US, leading to a vicious cycle of poor financial health leading to worsening medical health.

CoverUS started in 2020 by launching our prescription discount app where members can save up to 87% on their medications. We resolved to be better than the competition, setting a high bar for our price accuracy, ease-of-use, and privacy. We’ve been gratified that so many of you have loved CoverUS, and use it every time you fill a prescription.

But prescriptions are just one piece of your health spending picture. From day one we’ve looked for other ways to help you afford your health care, like office visits to doctors, dentists, and chiropractors; mental health services; labs work and radiology; and retail expenses like optometry and medical equipment.

At the same time, to fix the systemic problem of out-of-control health care costs, we knew we’d need to do something to help medical providers: help them find new patients, increase utilization, and build a data-driven platform  to help providers of services and products find the people who need them – more cheaply and efficiently.

As is often the way in these things, when you start to do something bold, you find allies engaged in the same struggle. Several months ago we connected with the team at HealthNow, and its CEO Steven Zinsli, and found that they share our mission to radically improve health by reducing the cost barriers to care. 

Steven started out as a Musculoskeletal Podiatrist. He saw firsthand the challenges to accessing care: rising costs saw 39% of New Zealanders annually neglect or delay getting needed care, and up to 25% failing to fill their prescriptions. Steven saw the potential for technology to help bridge this gap, and started HealthNow. So the mission and vision of our companies couldn’t be more in sync.

HealthNow’s payment platform connects people to a marketplace of health and medical providers, and lets them spread out health care payments over up to twelve weeks, with no fees or interest.  It also offers a health wallet for self-insurance, as well as employer aid, where workplaces deposit funds that employees can spend directly on health care products and services.

When we got to know HealthNow, we saw they’d already built some of the next steps we’d need for CoverUS: expanding beyond pharmacy, becoming a payment provider, and bringing providers into the solution. Even more potent: letting consumers spread out their payments over time is a huge boost to getting care when it’s needed. Combined with CoverUS’s pharmacy discount platform and pricing expertise, privacy-first patient and marketplace data layer, and US health care partnerships, the pairing just made sense.

It became clear that by combining our efforts, we could reach more people and health providers, more quickly, to bring urgently needed financial relief to those seeking care. And when people stop delaying care, they improve their long term health outcomes – while driving efficiencies in the entire healthcare ecosystem.

 The deal came together quickly, and was completed in April with HealthNow acquiring CoverUS in an asset transaction. A new US company was created, HealthNow US, Inc., which will do business under the CoverUS name.

What does this mean for the CoverUS Prescription Savings app?

Don’t worry, you can keep using the CoverUS prescription savings app just like before! We’re committed to helping you save on your medications, and we’ll continue to add new features and find the best discounts.

What will the new CoverUS services look like?

Starting in Q3 2022, we’ll launch CoverUS Payments in the US. We’re taking a regional roll-out approach, initially focusing on the West Coast, then expanding to rest of the US, and eventually, to other global regions.

The CoverUS Payments app for iOS and Android will offer the full suite of HealthNow features and benefits:

• A marketplace of health and medical providers - find providers by category and location in a large and growing number of health categories: doctors,  dentists, pharmacies, mental health, optometry, women’s health, physical therapy, medical equipment, and more.

• A simple digital payment solution for your care appointments and health products and services.

• Ability to spread a health expense into smaller payments over up to twelve weeks.

• Free to use: consumers pay no fees or interest

• Health wallet: Set aside funds in that can be used by the whole family

• Employer aid: companies can contribute to employee’s health wallets and ensure the benefits are used for health services.

How can medical providers get early access to CoverUS Payments?

The CoverUS Payments marketplace is where our consumers find health providers and services who accept CoverUS Payments. Participating is affordable for providers and can improve your patient flow, reduce canceled appointments, and help your patients get the care they need. Sign up here to be notified of early access and learn more about how CoverUS payments can help your practice or business.