Looking ahead In 2024, we will continue to implement our strategic goals and enrich our service levels. We will also be focusing on a range of sustainability issues in alignment with Group strategy. This began with a process of benchmarking our environmental footprint against similar companies both locally and internationally. We will also be focusing on growth beyond the country’s borders to expand our footprint. As always, we will continue to develop innovative ways to manage costs that enhance the member experience. And, from an affordability point of view, we will continue to work with the schemes we administer to ensure that they can offer packages tailored to meet the needs of their members. PPSHA continues to meet the high standards of service delivery expected by the schemes we serve and we look forward to a successful year in 2024. In terms of this agreement, we now guarantee that we will respond to member queries via e-mail within three hours, significantly exceeding the industry standard for query resolution. This is in addition to our webchat which provides immediate query resolution. To be able to do this, we reviewed and enhanced our training for client services consultants (our brand ambassadors for the schemes they service) and introduced innovative technology that enables quicker first contact resolution. The process of enhancing the benefits offered through the Profmed scheme is ongoing. Added values introduced in the previous period, such as the PPS Wallet, PPS Gap and dental risk management, have all been very well received. In addition to these enhancements for Profmed, we introduced a full suite of managed healthcare services for the RFCMF, completed in April 2023. Our comprehensive administration and management services have improved the scheme’s sustainability. There were, of course, challenges we encountered during the year. For example, while membership figures increased in some schemes, they continued to decline in others. As in the previous period, this was due to professionals in private practice moving into corporate employment and thus having to join their employers’ medical scheme; members coming under financial pressure and having to terminate medical scheme cover altogether; emigration; and the proliferation of unregulated health insurance solutions on the market, which consumers often confuse for medical schemes. We nevertheless remained within total anticipated membership numbers for all the schemes under administration. We have achieved our service level agreements as required by our clients. As in 2022, we continued to see an increase in claims for elective procedures, many of which had been put on hold during the pandemic. We also continued to see an increase in the number and size of claims for both maternity and cancer admissions. There has also been an increase in delivering hospital-level care safely and effectively at members’ homes for a variety of medical conditions, for which they would otherwise be admitted to hospital. During the year, we have partnered with an international company to provide an artificial intelligence-assisted readmission management programme, which is currently in proof-of-concept stage. This will involve monitoring post-hospitalisation care closely to ensure better treatment outcomes and reduce the need for readmissions. From an operations point of view, we continued to consolidate recent innovations and developments such as our telehealth services and our digitally enabled, outcomes-based managed care solution. We are also assessing overall capacity to accommodate schemes and members from new markets and territories. Development-wise, we retain the B-BBEE Level 2 accreditation that we first received in 2022 and continue to contribute funding to the PPS Foundation. This is used to fund bursaries for study in the healthcare disciplines but, where need can be demonstrated, to extend support for studies in other scarce skill disciplines as well. Our solid performance in 2023 is reflected in the R358 million in revenue we recorded, up 4% compared to that of 2022. GROUP PERFORMANCE 44 Group performance
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