Renovating approach to the issue

The reality shows that in many localities, communication work conducted by social and health insurance agencies remains inefficient. The voluntary social insurance policy has a long-term effect on individuals, thus people are normally careful to make a decision of joining.

Therefore, it is necessary to promote the preeminence and necessity of the policy through more attractive and understandable methods of communications. Particularly, talks on the issue should be held in a way that allows quick and easy dialogue for participants to receive clear replies to their doubts and misunderstanding.

Currently, some new approaches have been piloted using social media networks such as Facebook, Zalo and email.

A working day of Do Thi Huong, an insurance agent at Phung Thuong commune in Phuc Tho district, started with posting information related to social and health insurance to her Facebook and Zalo accounts. She took care to write the posts in a simple form so that they are easy to understand and remember with specific instructions, suitable for the understanding of the local community. Huong said each post was shared and commented by dozens of people in the commune.

 “I find this method very effective, helping people access information easy and enabling them to be more open in making their questions. Today, both young labourers and the elderly use Internet connected smart phones, thus online communication is suitable for them,” said Huong.

However, this method requires the insurance agent to have a wide circle of acquaintances, while posts should be updated frequently. Direct meetings are still required to support those who wish to join the insurance with procedures.

Tay Ho district is also planning some new approaches in expanding insurance coverage. Phung Thi Ngoc Anh, deputy head of the district Party Committee Commission of Education and Communications said that in order to build an e-government, since early 2017, the Secretary of the district’s Party Committee has assigned the district committee of the Ho Chi Minh Communist Youth Union to register email addresses for local residents. Currently, 90 percent of local households have had their own emails, making it an effective channel to popularise social and health insurance, Anh said.

Sharing Anh’s opinion, Nguyen Thi Viet Ha, Vice Chairwoman of the People’s Committee of Thuy Khue ward of Tay Ho district was of the opinion that communications through email is feasible, allowing quick and effective interaction between citizens and the government, thus changing the awareness and attitude of people, persuading them to join voluntary social insurance and health insurance for households.

Wide network of insurance agents

The social insurance sector has been working for many years to develop and diversify a network of social insurance agents. Currently, Hanoi has 1,417 points of transactions for social and health insurance with 1,777 trained and certified staff members. There are at least two networks of agents to collect insurance premium in each district and ward (one run by the post office and another by People’s Committees of communes, wards and towns). Besides, depending on the characteristics of each locality, other networks will be developed through the Women’s Union, Farmers’ Association, district health care station and population committees.

The People’s Committee of Soc Son district is one of the first localities of Hanoi piloting the development of an insurance agent network through the district’s health care station, and utilising communes’ health care stations. Right in the first month of launching in December 2015, the network persuaded nearly 2,000 households to join health insurance.

In Dan Phuong district, the local Women’s Union actively engaged in efforts to expanding social and health insurance coverage. Since 2015, the union coordinated with the district’s Social Insurance to set up points of transaction for insurance premium collection in communes and towns. Members of the unions have operated actively, persuading 8,000 people joining social insurance for households each year. At the same time, the union has launched a movement to collect donations to buy hundreds of health insurance card for poor members.

Dam Thi Hoa, Vice Director of Hanoi Social Security Office said that each agency or organisation has their own methods of communications to call for people joining voluntary social insurance and household health care insurance. The more points of transaction for insurance premium collection there are, the easier for localities to access and persuade local residents to join insurance.

According to Hoa, among people covered by voluntary social insurance in Hanoi, only about 30 percent are new participants. The rest 70 percent had participated in compulsory insurance for some time earlier and they joined voluntary social insurance to be eligible for pension.

Those who join voluntary social insurance are workers in the informal sector, free labourers with unstable and unsustainable income. This is also a group with largest number of people yet to join health insurance for households. Therefore, the above methods of communications are expected to attract more people to voluntary social insurance and health insurance for households.

International Cooperation Department