Alegeus Announces Support for Expansion of SIGIS IIAS Standard to Include Vision

Alegeus, the market leader in consumer directed healthcare (CDH) solutions, today announced its support for a proposed enhancement to the widely-used Inventory Information Approval System (IIAS) – created and maintained by SIGIS (the Special Interest Group for IIAS Standards).  The SIGIS IIAS is the industry-standard inventory coding system that allows pharmacy point-of-sale (POS) systems to discern whether transactions are FSA-eligible via the product SKU. The proposed change would expand the standard to include vision-related prescriptions and merchants.

The proposed addition of vision to the IIAS standard would be a step forward in making FSAs and benefit debit cards more consumer-friendly – as well as creating back office efficiencies for the organizations that administer them. Because the IIAS system would be able to auto-substantiate the eligibility of purchased items at the point of sale, this change would minimize the consumer inconvenience and administrative burden of tracking down receipt documentation for vision-related purchases.

SIGIS, the cross-industry working group that created the IIAS standard, will convene this fall to determine whether the change will take effect.  If approved, vision merchants would then leverage the IIAS standard to code their point-of-sale terminals to begin offering auto-substantiated vision prescriptions.

The continued expansion of industry standards and processes that simplify healthcare payments for consumers would be a win for the industry – as we continue our transition to a consumer directed healthcare system,” said Robert Natt, Alegeus Executive Chairman. “Creating a better consumer healthcare experience is our passion and is always a top priority in our decision-making. The fact that this change has tremendous benefit to consumers, and also serves to lower costs and administrative overhead for our clients makes it a no-brainer from our perspective.

Alegeus offers the industry’s most comprehensive and widely used consumer directed healthcare platform – powering nearly 40 percent of the industry’s account-based programs (including FSAs, HSAs, HRAs) and benefit debit cards.  As part of its initial platform development work to implement the IIAS standard for pharmacy, Alegeus made a strategic decision to also add the capabilities for vision and dental – even though they were not a part of the initial standard.  This means that, upon approval of this expanded IIAS standard, Alegeus clients would be able to immediately support the change.

When the IIAS standard was first introduced, Alegeus predicted that this change was likely to occur – so we built our IIAS capabilities to support this future state. We can simply flip a switch and offer product differentiation that is unparalleled in the market,” said Natt. “This is yet another example of Alegeus leading the industry with our solution capabilities and empowering our clients with the agility to quickly respond as the market landscape evolves.

About Alegeus

With more than 25 years of growth and innovation, Alegeus is the market leader in SaaS-based healthcare payment solutions. Our highly flexible, white-label platform powers account-based benefit programs such as HSAs, FSAs, HRAs, COBRA, wellness incentives, lifestyle benefits and beyond. We deliver exceptional user experiences and differentiated capabilities that help our partners strengthen their product offerings, operate more efficiently, and unlock their full growth potential. Our partnerships with the industry’s leading health plans, third-party administrators, financial services and benefit solution providers give Alegeus unparalleled reach in the market. And our unique partnership model empowers our clients to achieve outsized results – growing their programs at a rate that is 2-3X the market, and with the highest net promoter scores (NPS) in the industry. We never compete with our clients – we win when they win. Alegeus is headquartered in Waltham, Mass., with operations centers in Orlando and Bangalore, and a large remote workforce.

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