The National Health Insurance Authority (NHIA) is introducing an online platform that will allow registered members of the National Health Insurance Scheme (NHIS) renew their policy with ease.
The service will also help the authority verify claims and authenticate people who visit the health centres as registered members of the scheme.
Known as the NHIS mobile renewal service, members are required to dial *929# on MTN, Vodafone, and Airtel-Tigo networks to access service.
President Nana Addo Dankwa Akufo-Addo will officially launch the online system on Wednesday, December 19, 2018.
Services
Members who access the service will be able to check when their policy will expire, how to renew their policy; to be done by entering their NHIA card or Ghana Card number and subsequently pay through mobile money and other digital payment systems.
The service will also enable them to check their benefit package and medicine list.
Meeting
Speaking at a stakeholder meeting with journalists in Accra last Friday, December 14, this year, the Deputy Chief Executive in charge of Operations at the NHIA, Dr Lydia Baaba Dsane-Selby, said the platform would, among others, reduce long queues at NHIS district offices, increase engagement between the NHIA and membership, increase remote renewals, and reduce transportation and income cost.
She said 12 million people were currently active out of the more than 18 million people who were registered on the NHIS and thus the online service would encourage all Ghanaians to register and become active.
She added that “soon those with the National ID card but without NHIA registration would be able to use their National ID and mobile phone to register to become an NHIA member without going to the district office.
Moving forward, Dr Selby said, “The authority will use the system to inform NHIS members how much money a hospital had claimed in their name.”
“But we need to get all healthcare providers to embrace the system since it acts as a check and balance to the scheme.
Journalists must also help support the innovation by educating the public and acting as watchdogs on public expenditure,” she said.
NHIS
The Board Chairman of the NHIA, Professor Yaw Adu-Gyamfi, who was present at the meeting, asked Ghanaians to eschew politicisation of the scheme, adding that the authority had no political colours.
Rather, he said, all must support the scheme, particularly the media to help deliver universal health coverage.
A representative from the International Labour Organisation’s Impact Insurance Facility, Ms Lisa Morgan, expressed the organisation’s pleasure in collaborating with the NHIS to make for easy access to the NHIS.
She said the service would help reduce about 12 hours NHIS members spend in various districts attempting to renew their policy.
Source: Graphic.com.gh
