TriWest’s Customer Outreach has Grassroots History

Celebrating 11 years of doing ‘Whatever it Takes’ during National Customer Service Week

PHOENIX (Oct. 2, 2007)— Only weeks after TriWest Healthcare Alliance won its first contract in 1996 to administer the military’s health care program, it also launched its first customer outreach effort, which TriWest acknowledges as part of its National Customer Service Week, Oct. 1-5, recognition.

TriWest was focused on testing its customer service model before ever serving a single customer. To do so, TriWest’s customer outreach effort initially consisted of establishing an advisory board comprised of military-oriented associations. These representatives were uniquely qualified to provide customer service insights for the special needs of military Service members, their families and military retirees.

Since the launch of TriWest’s National Military Association Advisory Board in the summer of 1996, the advisory board participants and TriWest have become close working partners who now are beginning a second decade of a productive collaboration. Current TriWest National Military Advisory Board members represent the following organizations:

• Association of the United States Army (AUSA)
• Chief Warrant Officer and Warrant Officer Association (CWO&WOA) of the United States Coast Guard
• Commissioned Officers Association of the United States Public Health Service, Inc. (COAUSPHS)
• Enlisted Association of the National Guard of the United States (EANGUS)
• Fleet Reserve Association (FRA)
• Gold Star Wives of America (GSW)
• Military Officers Association of America (MOAA)
• National Association for Uniformed Services (NAUS)
• National Guard Association of the United States (NGAUS)
• National Military Family Association (NMFA)
• Reserve Officers Association (ROA)
• The Retired Enlisted Association (TREA)

"The military representatives we’ve been working with all these years have proven to be great partners in improving the customer service we provide to TRICARE West Region beneficiaries," said TriWest President and CEO David McIntyre, Jr. "We’re flattered that other organizations administering the TRICARE program have followed the TriWest model and started advisory boards of their own –

recognizing the importance of these groups and the value in working together to make TRICARE the best it can be for our shared customers."

As part of TriWest’s customer service efforts, representatives from the military advisory board and TriWest leadership tour large and small military installations throughout the West Region gathering information to help customer service processes, pinpoint customer needs, and identify TRICARE systemic issues that the association representatives can raise with the Department of Defense and Congressional leadership.

The annual tours, which began in 1999, most recently included visits to Army, Air Force and Coast Guard installations in Alaska, highlighting some of the unique challenges facing TRICARE customers and those meeting to service their health care needs.

TriWest expanded its advisory board efforts five years ago when it formed its Executive Advisory Board, a group of senior health care industry executives and retired career military officers.

"Our customers deserve the best service imaginable and we’re always looking for ways to raise the bar," McIntyre said. "More than a job, it’s our privilege to serve this deserving and special population and we couldn’t do it without the insight and honest opinions of those who sit on our advisory boards."