A giant health employee benefit group is to offer optical professionals free marketing to attract staff of household name companies to their practices as new patients.

VSP, which works with 26,000 optometrists in the US, is about to recruit practitioners in this country, highlighting its promotional benefits in return for practitioners giving a 20% discount on eye care and eyewear to employee members of its scheme.

The business, which boasts Apple Computers, IBM and Starbucks among its high-profile health benefit clients, requires practitioners to reduce their prices to VSP patients by a blanket 20% figure to belong. In return, the practices who join will be marketed on VSP’s website, and client employees will be directed to member practices via employee benefit schemes. Family members of employees who benefit can also use the scheme, so creating further word-of-mouth publicity about an individual practice, the company said. UPS, Toyota and United Airlines also are amongst other companies which use VSP for the benefit of its staff, and the US health plan group has had meeting with some of the world’s biggest benefit adviser organisations this month to enlist more.

Ric Steere, its chief development officer, global managed vision care, presented the company to a number of optometrists in London last week, and told them about the plan behind the UK launch.

“Our employee benefit clients have a lot of employees over here in the UK,” he said, “so it was logical that we should continue that successful relationship in other countries.”

As well as launching in the UK, Mr Steere said VSP was to now target Canada as well, to add to the number of people benefiting from its services, which totals 55 million patients in the US, or one-in-every-six individuals.

He revealed that a ‘medium-sized opticians chain’ in the UK has all but signed up to join and he hoped other opticians would follow suit during 2010.

“What we like to do is direct patients into your practices,” he told an AOP council meeting. “Right now we’re starting to work recruiting other optometrists into our UK network. With the first to sign we’ll have about 80,000 patients eligible to enjoy 20% discounts on eye care and eyewear. I hope in the New Year that number will grow.”

VSP was established by a group of US optometrists in 1955 in an effort to ‘drive patients to their practices’ said Mr Steere.

It is a non-profit organisation which continues to have a majority of optometrists on its board, and bought Marchon Frames last year. In addition it runs a practice management system, and other interests.

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ANON
November 21st, 2009
I feel that UK doctors should avoid VSP and fight their spread into the UK. I am a VSP provider in the US simply because it has become necessary and is the lesser of two evils.

Beware of the 20% mandatory discount. On July 1, 2009, we were required to change from 20% to 30% "in order for VSP to remain competitive." Yes, that's right. Their own letter stated for them to be competitive, we had to give a greater discount.