Healthcare’s Next Competitive Advantage Isn’t Coverage. It’s Cash Flow.

Consumers have been trained by the rest of the digital economy to expect money to move quickly.

Instant deposits and real-time peer-to-peer payments have narrowed the gap between when a transaction is initiated and when people expect to see the money. Against that benchmark, a healthcare reimbursement that takes five to seven days can feel less like ordinary financial processing and more like friction built into the experience.

That expectation gap is beginning to matter strategically for healthcare organizations.

According to the PYMNTS Intelligence report “The Power of Now: Moving at the Speed of Life: Why Real-Time Payments Matter for Healthcare Insurance Payouts,” a collaboration with Visa Direct, payment delays are shaping how consumers experience insurers after a claim has already been resolved.

The report revealed why speed, reliability and visibility of disbursements are becoming part of the customer experience. That experience is turning payouts into something more consequential than back-office plumbing. In an economy where money increasingly moves in real-time, payout infrastructure is no longer hidden entirely behind the healthcare experience. It’s becoming part of the experience itself.

Healthcare Payouts Are Moving Closer to the Sector’s Competitive Edge

The PYMNTS Intelligence and Visa Direct report found that approximately 82% of healthcare insurers rely at least partially on third-party payment processors whose capabilities can affect how quickly members receive money. Only about one-quarter directly control which payment methods those processors use.

That creates an unusual competitive dynamic. A company may own the customer relationship while depending on outside infrastructure for one of the most tangible moments in it: getting money into the customer’s hands.

Health plans, third-party administrators, pharmacy benefit managers, providers and digital health platforms have good reason to treat disbursements as a customer-facing capability rather than simply an operational process. An organization that can deliver funds quickly and reliably can potentially reduce payment-status inquiries and other servicing costs while giving members a more seamless experience.

The research also found that questions about payment status are among insurers’ most common operational friction points, alongside rejected payments caused by inaccurate recipient information. Delays, incorrect banking credentials and manual review can turn a relatively routine reimbursement into an expensive service interaction.

For consumers, the distinction is even simpler. A reimbursement that requires additional days to arrive or clear can still produce frustration even when every underlying claim-processing requirement has been satisfied.

Read the report: The Power of Now: Moving at the Speed of Life: Why Real-Time Payments Matter for Healthcare Insurance Payouts

Fast Payouts Depend on the Systems Around the Healthcare Payment

Nearly two-thirds of insurers identified integration between claims platforms and payment systems as their most important modernization priority, while more than 60% said they were actively pursuing integration improvements.

That finding changes the frame around real-time healthcare payments. The opportunity is not necessarily to rebuild the payment stack. It is to connect systems that historically operated in sequence: determine what’s owed, identify the recipient, verify the destination and initiate the payment.

After all, real-time payouts are not simply a matter of selecting a faster rail. They also rely on identity verification, fraud management, integration between claims and payment systems, credential management and continuously updated data. Visa Direct can help enable those fast, secure payout experiences.

Different transactions carry different fraud, verification and operational requirements. Insurers that can reliably deliver faster payouts when appropriate may gain an increasingly meaningful advantage.

Once consumers know funds can arrive quickly elsewhere in their financial lives, every additional day in a healthcare reimbursement becomes more visible.