Medibank closes retail stores to protect its people and customers

As the coronavirus (COVID-19) outbreak continues to develop daily, Medibank will temporarily close its retail stores across the country from close of business Tuesday 31 March, in order to protect the health and safety of our employees and our customers.

Medibank Chief Customer Officer David Koczkar said that this decision had been made to help stop the spread of the coronavirus.

“We are putting the health and wellbeing of our people and our customers first in making this decision,” he said.

“In recent weeks our customers have shown an increasing desire to use our phone and 24/7 webchat, as more Australians heed the Australian Government’s advice on social distancing. These measures are crucial to help Australia ‘flatten the curve’ and support our nation’s incredible healthcare workers.”

Prior to this announcement Medibank had taken a number of steps to protect our team members including:
• Increasing the frequency of cleaning
• Practising social distancing measures in store
• Asking customers to stay away from stores if they are feeling unwell, if they have recently travelled overseas, have been in contact with a confirmed case of coronavirus, if they are waiting on a coronavirus test result, or if they should be in self-isolation
• Closed 7 stores due to inadequate hand washing facilities, and reduced the opening hours of our other 76 stores

“We recognise that our people and our customers increasingly want to stay at home. I would like to take this opportunity to thank our exceptional retail team who have continued to service our customers during this challenging time. We couldn’t have asked anything more of you,” Mr Koczkar said.

“We are incredibly proud of the way you have supported and reassured customers.”

Team members will be redeployed across other customer support channels including our phone and digital network, working remotely from home where possible.

Medibank remains focused on continuing to provide the best possible customer service during this unprecedented event. Customers can continue to call us on 132 331 and log onto the My Medibank app, as well as use 24/7 web chat via the website for any enquiries. They can also continue to send in claims via post (Medibank Private Limited, GPO BOX 2984, Melbourne VIC 3001).

We thank our customers for their patience and understanding during this time and look forward to re-opening our stores when it is safe to do so.

This situation is having real and very significant impacts on the daily lives of Australians, which is why we recently announced an initial support package in excess of $50 million to assist customers at this time.

The package includes:
• Regardless of an existing customer’s level of hospital cover, we will pay benefits towards chest, heart, lung and kidney hospital admissions related to the coronavirus. This includes customers with Basic and Bronze levels of cover.
• Introducing a specific financial hardship policy allowing customers to suspend their policy or access some relief on their premium payments.

We also committed to ensuring that our customers benefit from unforeseen financial gains in light of the Australian Government’s cancellation of non-urgent elective surgery in private hospitals to free up critical health resources.

Outside of our retail network, we have effectively been operating as a virtual business for the past 2 weeks, with the vast majority of our employees across the country working from home.

Medibank is also helping to support the health and wellbeing of our employees with the introduction of paid Special Leave of 2 weeks to support any team member (permanent, fixed term or casual) who may be affected by coronavirus.

Media enquiries: Emily Ritchie – 0429 642 418