The will is there, actions do not follow

In March 2021, the consulting firm Accenture had 1,052 Swiss people surveyed and wanted to find out how many people could currently imagine changing their health insurance. The respondents came from all age groups and linguistic regions in Switzerland. According to their own statements, two out of three people surveyed can imagine changing health insurance. You would even consider separating health and supplementary insurance and thus be insured with different providers. A quarter of those questioned had actually already taken this step before and had separated the two types of insurance. It is therefore no longer common practice to have both basic and supplementary insurance with the same provider.

When asked where the respective recommendation for the current health insurance came from, 43 percent of the respondents said that they had received the recommendation from family and friends. According to this, only 15.9 percent switch to a price comparison portal in accordance with the recommendations, and even fewer are those who switched to a specific health insurance company because of the recommendations by the insurance advisor or the employer or because of advertising. The changes themselves were noticeably frequent to Helsana and CSS, which were chosen by 47 percent of those who changed on January 1, 2021.

Only 6.8 percent of those questioned had actually made a change. Most people would like to switch, but shy away from the effort involved. Maybe it's a missed deadline or a certain convenience. Exactly what reasons are responsible for the low number of bills of exchange could not be answered in the course of the survey.

Insurers do not use potential

Experts assume that health insurers are not making use of the existing switch potential. Sales are particularly important here, as they have to recognize which customers want to switch. They have to be offered a product that is precisely tailored to them in order not to make the switch. In view of the low switching rates, however, the insurers may shy away from the higher expense because not so many insured people switch to other providers anyway. Nevertheless, the big task for sales should be to conduct better analyzes in order to find customers willing to switch. Because at some point there will also be a slight fluctuation!

The surveys made it clear that it was primarily the financial side that made the decision to switch. Around 67 percent of those surveyed stated that a higher price for the insurance product they selected was the most important reason they wanted to switch. In contrast, only 18 percent were responsible for the product itself or the service offered, which was classified as inadequate. If you want to change, you usually rely on the recommendations of relatives and friends. So it is not about the statements of the advertising, but actual experiences of known people from their own environment are believed.

Conclusion: where there is a will, there no change?

Even if a large number of respondents in this study stated that they would like to change health insurers, not even ten percent of people make this change. The respondents are representative of all Swiss, for whom it can be assumed that the situation with regard to the change is similar. The few insured persons who actually switch have switched to another insurance provider, mainly due to the price development of the insurance premiums. Here it is therefore important for the provider to use analyzes to make reliable statements about ways to retain the insured.