CIGNA Launches "Personal" Participant Portal

And while plan sponsors will have to wait a bit for their version, the new participant service, myCIGNA.com, is now available to all CIGNA Retirement & Investment Services plan participants as well as to CIGNA customers enrolled in both CIGNA HealthCare and CIGNA Retirement & Investment Services plans.  Beginning July 21, most of CIGNA HealthCare’s 14.3 million health plan participants also will have access to the myCIGNA.com portal.

“The portal is a mosaic,” Joseph P. Smoolca, senior vice president of technology for CIGNA Retirement & Investment Services told PLANSPONSOR.com .  “The participant can put their own stamp on it.” 

myCIGNA.com, is free to CIGNA’s 16 million retirement and health plan participants and is being launched in collaboration with Yahoo! and Sun Microsystems.  Plans for the portal, which uses the same portal technology as My Yahoo!, were announced in January (see CIGNA Gets Personal with Yahoo! ). 

Building on the technology and approach of the popular My Yahoo, the new site will offer:

• greater personalization – the site reflects preferences established by the participant, both in terms of general information and specific account data, rather than just a participant’s name alongside a generic set of widely-used Web links
• more benefits info integration – the site combines information for CIGNA’s health care coverages (medical, dental and pharmacy) as well as CIGNA’s retirement programs (pension, 401(k), non-qualified plans and online brokerage services).  Those transaction tools and updated account information are integrated with CIGNA’s other forms of customer care and support, including paper-based claims documents and live and voice-response customer call center services.

“The portal offers the ability to tailor information based on a need”, according to Smoolca. 

Access-Ability

Participants can access their personalized data from work, at home, or on the road, through a variety of means including company Intranets, over the Internet at www.CIGNA.com – even through an individual’s My Yahoo! Home page.

With mycigna.com, participants in CIGNA-administered programs will be able to:

• track and review medical claims and other health account information, as well as update personal information, locate, select or change health care providers, and order CIGNA HealthCare ID cards online.
• access a consolidated, interactive snapshot of their retirement plan balances, as well as updated balances from online brokerage accounts as well as a person’s Social Security account. 
• tap into customized online financial education and retirement/savings tools.
• perform online transactions such as ordering medications, including online access to CIGNA’s Tel-Drug online pharmacy which offers information and home delivery of prescription drugs, as well as access to the CIGNA Healthy Rewards alternative medicine program
• receive personalized investment and health news, as well as customized health and retirement savings information

As for plan sponsors, CIGNA plans to bring these same technologies to bear on their needs in the first half of next year, according to Smoolca.  Plan sponsors will be able to see, in aggregate, what participants are accessing as a means to refine and focus educational efforts.  “Plan sponsors will be able to see how many participants are checking out which courses,” Smoolca said – “and see if there has been a change in participant behavior as a result.”

You can find out more at http://www.cigna.com , or call 800-574-0615.