This conference call transcript was computer generated and almost certianly contains errors. This transcript is provided for information purposes only.EarningsCall, LLC makes no representation about the accuracy of the aforementioned transcript, and you are cautioned not to place undue reliance on the information provided by the transcript.
spk08: Good afternoon, everyone, and welcome to eHealth, Inc.' 's conference call to discuss the company's third quarter 2022 financial results. At this time, all participants have been placed in listen-only mode. The floor will open for your questions following the presentation. It is now my pleasure to turn the floor over to Eli Newbrun-Mintz, Senior Investor Relations Manager.
spk06: Please go ahead.
spk05: Good afternoon and thank you all for joining eHealth Inc's third quarter 2022 financial results call. Joining me today are Fran Soisman, Chief Executive Officer, and Christine Janofsky, Chief Financial Officer. After management's prepared remarks, we will open the lines for questions. As a reminder, today's conference call is being recorded and webcast from the investor relations section of our website. A replay of the call will be available on our website following the call. We will be making forward-looking statements on this call that include statements regarding future events, beliefs, and expectations, including statements relating to our expectations regarding the Medicare market and individual and family plan market, including current market and enrollment trends, consumer demand, our competitive advantage and market opportunities, our investment and enrollment quality initiatives, our omnichannel capabilities, and call center operations, and expected impact of these investments on customer conversion, customer retention, and other quality metrics. Our expectations regarding our marketing and member acquisition strategies and sales channels. Our expectations regarding our business strategy, operating plan, and financial performance, including the profitability of our business, cost savings, cash flows, conversion rates, customer retention, lifetime values, acquisition costs, member estimates, and fixed and operating expenses, and our full year 2022 financial guidance. Forward-looking statements on this call represent eHealth's views as of today. You should not rely on these statements as representing our views in the future. We undertake no obligation or duty to update information contained in these forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events, or otherwise. Forward-looking statements are subject to risks and uncertainties, that could cause actual results to differ materially from those projected in our forward-looking statements. We describe these and other risks and uncertainties in our earnings release, annual report on Form 10-K, and quarterly reports on Form 10-Q filed with the SEC, which you may access through the SEC website or from the investor relations section of our website. We will also be presenting certain non-GAAP financial measures on this call. For reconciliation of each non-GAAP financial measure to the most directly comparable GAAP financial measure, please refer to the information included in our press release and in our SEC filings, which you may access from the investor relations section of our website. I will now turn the call over to Fran Soisman.
spk03: Thanks, Eli. Good afternoon, and thank you to everyone joining us for our third quarter 22 earnings call. Today, I will review our third quarter results and provide an update on our execution as we prepare for the important enrollment season, which started on October 15th in the Medicare market and November 1st in the individual and family plan market. I began my tenure at eHealth just about one year ago this month. Since then, we've assembled a new leadership team and developed a comprehensive long-range strategic plan for returning the company to sustainable, profitable growth while delivering a differentiated value proposition to carrier partners and customers. Significant operational changes were implemented across all critical areas of the organization this year as we started to execute against the plan with additional initiatives roadmap for 2023 and beyond. Our initial achievements will be tested and leveraged for success during this important time when millions of customers shop for individual and Medicare plans. During this enrollment period, our company will assist tens of thousands of Americans to shop and enroll into plans that represent an optimal match for their personal preferences, health needs, and budgets. Our sales agents and product teams are performing the critical work of assisting customers in navigating a complex landscape of health plan options, guiding beneficiaries through plan features and key selection criteria, as well as providing the enrollment methods that are most convenient for the beneficiary or their caregivers. This important service is provided in a multi-carrier choice environment that meets beneficiaries when, where, and how they want to be served. We give consumers the ability to shop and enroll through a host of different methods, including telephonically, online using their personal computers, laptops, tablets, or mobile devices, through live chat, or fully unassisted using our digital tools. Our omnichannel shop, educate, buy, and enroll capabilities are also critically important for our carrier partners who depend on health insurance advisors like eHealth to generate quality enrollments at scale. eHealth, in particular, provides carriers with access to beneficiaries who value comparison shopping and are more technologically savvy. We continue to place the utmost emphasis on our relationships with carrier partners as we work together to provide customers with exceptional and memorable experiences with the intention of establishing lifelong relationships. eHealth's relationships with our carrier partners have been strengthened throughout the last year, and I believe our partnerships have never been healthier. During the quarter, eHealth continued to execute against the six-point operating plan that we've outlined on our prior earnings calls, and which can be found on slide 11 of our earnings presentation. Improving our cost structure is an important element of the plan, and we are now on track to deliver more than $90 million in year-over-year cost savings in 2022. These savings are coming from variable cost reductions with the largest impact expected in Q4, as well as rationalizing our fixed cost base. In addition to improving our profitability and cash flow profile this year, The cost reduction program underway will also allow us to enter 2023 on a much stronger foundation. As you recall, the cost transformation execution began in April. The full annualized impact will be realized in 2023, supplemented by additional cost eliminations and reductions that we expect to execute on in the early part of the new year. While enhancing cash flow and profitability is an important part of the operating plan, our transformation is clearly not limited to cost eliminations and cost reductions. In the past year, we have made significant changes to our leadership team, most recently announcing the appointment of our new Chief Marketing Officer, Michelle Barbeau, and our Chief People Officer, Jana Brown. Internally, we promoted Bill Billings to Senior Vice President of Engineering and Information Security. The entire leadership team is aligned around our operating plan and broader strategic goals and is fully dedicated to the success of this company and our mission of connecting customers with quality, affordable health insurance coverage. The work on reconstituting the leadership team is near completion, and I believe we are assembling a truly special group of executives that have the experience, passion, and determination to lead eHealth towards our important mission of helping Americans find affordable health insurance coverage while exceeding our board and shareholders' expectations. Last month, eHealth leadership team signed a pledge outlining our commitment to Medicare beneficiaries and caregivers and the experience they can expect when they work with eHealth. It is comprised of six statements covering everything from our offering of a wide range of high-quality plans to making customer satisfaction the top criteria behind our plan recommendations to providing expert guidance and a friendly, easy-to-use shopping and enrollment process. as well as always acting with the highest degree of ethics and integrity. This is yet another example of the new ELF, an organization that strives to provide customers with exceptional and memorable experiences as they shop for health insurance plans. The pledge was shared with our carrier partners, CMS, and is proudly displayed on all of our websites. Operationally, One of the most important third quarter achievements has been a year-over-year increase in conversion rates on Medicare sales and enrollment calls. This is a critical metric that determines the effectiveness of our Medicare telesales organization and impacts not only the enrollment volumes, but also the per enrollment acquisition cost, one of the key drivers of member profitability. This year-over-year step up in conversion rates has continued through the first weeks of the AEP, where improvements to conversion are even more consequential given the significantly larger number of incoming calls compared to the rest of the year. We are seeing this year-over-year productivity improvement for our tenured agents as well as the agents newly hired for this AEP. As a reminder, the introduction of our enrollment quality initiatives about a year ago, which included call verification. resulted in a significant reduction of our telephonic conversion rates and impacted our financial performance. While over the past 12 months we have had to sacrifice enrollment volume as a result of these quality initiatives, it was the right decision. It allowed us to achieve significantly better CTM scores and improved our standing with major carriers. some of which now refer to e-health as the gold standard in enrollment quality. We are excited to see a year-over-year increase in conversions in Q3 that was accomplished while maintaining enhanced enrollment quality standards. Q3 revenue of 53.4 million decreased 16% year-over-year, reflecting a 37% reduction in Medicare variable acquisition costs compared to last year. which contributed to reduce lead volume partially offset by enhanced marketing effectiveness and improved conversion rates. Adjusted EBITDA loss was 33.1 million compared to a loss of 55.2 million in Q3 of 2021. Both revenue and adjusted EBITDA were in line with our internal plan. Third quarter marketing and agent cost per acquired Medicare member improved year over year. And we expect this trend to continue and be even more pronounced in the AEP driving meaningful expansion and LTV to CAC spread. Based on Q3 results and initial AEP observations, we are reaffirming the full year 2022 guidance ranges we provided on last quarter's call. In preparation for the AEP, we made changes to sales and marketing strategies and implemented new processes based on learnings from prior enrollment periods. At top of the funnel, we focused our marketing budgets on channel and customer segments to drive higher ROI enrollments and on specific days and times associated with stronger consumer response based on our data analytics. We are prepared to be opportunistic with portions of our budget that can be shifted on shorter notice. leaning into the top performing initiatives and campaigns as we progress through the AEP. As I shared with you on the last call, we did pull back from some of our historic channels, including Direct TV, and some of the lead aggregator partners as we reevaluate our programs in these areas for 23. In recognition of the dynamic nature of our end markets, we plan to test new channels with a small percentage of marketing budget allocated to test every quarter, One of the channels we are starting to lean into this year is our dedicated carrier range to drive volume to our enrollment platform without the associated marketing spend, allowing us to preserve valuable member acquisition budget. This is becoming an important supplement to our core lead generation strategy. eHealth omnichannel shopping and enrollment capabilities remain a key differentiator of our business model. We aim to provide a fluid, consistent experience as customers move across online and in-person interactions with our platform with an overarching goal to increase the total conversion rate from top of the funnel. In the past quarter, we made a number of investments to further augment enrollment options available to eHealth customers. The introduction of live agent chat and co-browsing has made it easier for beneficiaries to progress through the shopping and enrollment process in a way that fits their specific preferences, including the degree of agent assistance they want. For example, beneficiaries can begin their enrollment process online, hold their progress as they talk to their family and consider plan options, and then call in for a co-browsing session with a licensed agent to answer any remaining questions they might have and to complete the enrollment. Again, the key goal is to increase the overall demand conversion on all of our platforms, regardless of how the final submission is made. As a result, you might see a next shift of new enrollments into the hybrid online assisted category. Over the past year, we made significant enhancements to our call center operations, which are already driving a meaningful year-over-year increase in telephonic conversion rates. This included reengineering of our agent hiring and training processes. increase agent specialization by region and plan type, expansion of dedicated carrier and partner arrangements, and the introduction of the new agent-facing technology tools. Our telesales model is composed predominantly of full-time, in-house agents who we plan to retain year-round with the goal of increasing average agent tenure and creating an attractive career path for our best-performing sales professionals. Outside of the AEP, we expect to optimize agent force utilization through sales of ancillary products and providing value-added services to our members and carrier partners. In summary, we took the following steps over the past year to prepare for this AEP. We reduced our sales headcount compared to a year ago while meaningfully improving agent productivity. We re-engineered agent recruiting and training processes. We launched dedicated carrier and local market telesales. We made changes to marketing strategies focused on optimizing channel mix, increasing return on our acquisition costs, and fostering customer loyalty. And we introduced new omnichannel tools, including co-browsing and agent chat to increase overall lead conversion rates on our platform. These improvements to our omnichannel shopping and enrollment engine and marketing strategies are having a positive impact on our performance in the first weeks of the AEP. Compared to last year, we entered the selling season with a stronger pipeline of preset appointments with Medicare beneficiaries, which represents high intent leads. Our targeted demand generation campaigns combined with stronger telephonic conversion are driving enrollments that are being made at significantly lower per member acquisition costs compared to the same time a year ago. While we are still in the early stages of the AEP, we are pleased with our performance to date and believe it's a reflection of significant operational improvements put in place over the past year. In the individual and family plan segment, we remain cautiously optimistic about the growing ICHRA opportunity. ICHRA, which stands for individual coverage health reimbursement arrangement, allows employers to fund IFT premiums for their workforce as an affordable alternative to small business coverage. New health insurance programs typically take time to gain awareness of scale, and ICRA will likely follow the same path. We do believe, though, that if health insurance inflation continues to be a big driver of broader inflation in the country, ICRA will be a benefactor as it provides employers with an opportunity to reduce their financial exposure and provides employees greater portability of their health insurance. In preparation for the fourth quarter open enrollment period, we have launched a number of new partnerships, including some of the leading benefit administrators in the ICWA market. Looking back at my first year at eHealth, I am satisfied with the progress we've made and believe this organization underwent a tremendous amount of positive change. The improvements we have made to our sales and marketing organizations are already making a significant positive impact and are an important step on our path towards sustainable, profitable growth. eHealth and the broader sector performance of this AEP will inform our operational decisions for 2023. We will be finalizing next year's plan shortly after the AEP conclusion and plan to provide 23 guidance as part of our fourth quarter earnings release We also plan to hold an investor day in early 2023, and we'll be sharing more details when we report Q4 earnings. Above all, I would like to stress my conviction in eHealth's mission and the Medicare Advantage opportunity we are pursuing. Medicare Advantage continues to be a large and growing market with favorable demographic trends, and I believe eHealth provides unique value to beneficiaries by offering a broad selection of plans nationwide along with tools and advisory to sort through plans and the ability to enroll through a licensed region, online unassisted, or anywhere in between. With that, I will turn the call to our CFO, Christine Janowski, for some additional color on our financials. Christine?
spk00: Thank you, Fran. Good afternoon, everyone. Our third quarter results reflect a reduction in member acquisition costs pursuant to our cost transformation plans combined with a significant improvement in Medicare agent productivity. During the quarter, we generated similar Medicare enrollment volume compared to third quarter a year ago, while reducing variable acquisition spend in that segment by 37%. Third quarter Medicare revenue was $45.1 million, down 3% from Q3, 2021. Medicare commission revenue was 41.3 million, down 3% year over year. During the quarter, we recognized 1.7 million of positive adjustment or tail revenue in our Medicare business, reflective of positive cash collection trends on some of our older member cohorts. Third quarter Medicare non-commission revenue of 3.8 million was flat year over year and is comprised predominantly of carrier advertising revenue. Medicare segment loss was 23 million in the third quarter compared to a loss of 52.9 million a year ago, reflecting the impact of our cost transformation program and increased conversion rates in our telesales organization. Medicare Advantage approved enrollments were approximately 37,800, a year-over-year increase of 3%. Total Medicare enrollments, including Medicare Supplement and Medicare Part D approved members were approximately 44,900, or a 4% decline relative to Q3 of 21. The year-over-year decline in MedSupp and Part D enrollments are driven by secular shifts in consumer demand favoring MA and MAPD products, as well as our more targeted deployment of marketing spend on MA leads. We ended the third quarter with an estimated total Medicare Advantage paying membership of 582,000, which represents year-over-year growth of 4%. Total estimated Medicare membership was 905,000, or an increase of 3% compared to a year ago. MA LTV for third quarter was $953, down 2% on a year-over-year basis, reflecting stable churn observations on our historic third quarter cohort and a product mix impact. The third quarter is typically characterized by seasonally elevated per-member acquisition costs as we hire and train agents who are not yet fully productive during the quarter. and also invest in early marketing campaigns in preparation for the AEP. At the same time, through our transformation program, the improvements to our sales and marketing operations resulted in a year-over-year decline of 35% in per-member acquisition costs. As we enter the AEP, we expect to see a meaningful drop in our acquisition costs per approved Medicare member and a favorable LTV to tax spread compared to Q3 of this year as demand and conversion rates pick up. Third quarter Medicare Advantage online unassisted submitted applications grew 18% on a year-over-year basis, and partially assisted applications grew 39% as we continue to invest in omnichannel tools on our platform. Individual family and small business segment revenue was 8.2 million with segment profit of 2.7 million compared to 17.5 million and 12.5 million respectively in Q3 2021. The year-over-year decline in segment revenue and profitability is attributable mostly to lower tail revenue. In Q3 of this year, positive tail revenue in this segment was 1.8 million compared to 10 million in Q3 2021. We continue to observe favorable retention trends in our IFP business. Lifetime values of our non-QHP product grew 20% year over year. LTVs for QHP plans were down 2% after growing in double digits in 2021 and Q2 of this year. Total Q3 revenue was 53.4 million, a decline of 16% year over year. Gas net loss for Q3 was 39.1 million compared to a loss of 53 million in Q3 2021. Adjusted EBITDA loss was 33.1 million compared to negative 55.2 million in Q3 of 2021. Moving now to our expenses. In the third quarter, total gas operating expense was 101.6 million, down 22% from 130 million in Q3 2021. The decrease in total operating expense was driven by a decrease of 40% or 20 million in gap CC&E expense and a decrease of 29% or 12.8 million in total gap marketing and advertising spend from Q3 of 2021. On the fixed cost side, gap tech and content spend declined 5% year-over-year, while G&A increased 4% compared to Q3 a year ago. The year-over-year increase in GAAP G&A costs is primarily related to higher stock-based compensation expense. Last year, stock-based comp was positively impacted by a $4.1 million credit due to a reversal of a prior stock grant to our former CEO who departed a year ago. Third quarter operating costs also include a 3.7 million non-cash charge, primarily related to the subleasing agreement we signed on our Santa Clara office, leading to the recognition of a lease impairment. The sublease of our Santa Clara property is part of the remote first strategy we announced earlier this year and is expected to have a positive impact on our fixed cost structure over time. For the full year, we are now targeting total cost savings in excess of $90 million relative to 2021. These savings will be weighted towards variable spend, as you saw in Q3, and will have the highest impact in terms of absolute dollar amount in the fourth quarter. We ended the quarter with approximately $165 million in cash, cash equivalents, and marketable securities, and $66 million in debt. Our balance sheet also reflects a commission's receivable balance of approximately $786 million that is comprised of $208 million that we expect to collect over the next 12 months and $578 million in long-term commissions receivable. Operating cash flow for the second quarter was negative $29.6 million compared to negative $71 million a year ago. This represents a year-over-year improvement of more than $41 million. On a year-to-date basis, for the nine months ended September 30, 2022, net cash used in operating activities was $8.3 million, which compares to cash use of $60.3 million for the first nine months of 2021, or an improvement of $52 million. These improvements in cash use represent the initial results of our cost transformation program and significant operational improvements implemented over the past year, and we believe we can make further improvements in the coming quarters. Trailing 12-month Medicare commission cash collections were $331.1 million, an increase of 1% compared to a year ago. Turning to our full year 2022 guidance, we are reaffirming the ranges we gave last quarter. I am encouraged by our execution in the first weeks of the AEP. The progress we have made towards increasing the efficiency of our telesales and marketing organizations over the last year can be clearly seen in the initial enrollment metrics and is a positive sign for the trajectory of the business in both the near and longer term. In summary, we are well positioned to execute against our 2022 plan while continuing to drive toward the cost and operations related transformational commitment we have made to our investors. With that, I'll turn it back over to the operator to open up the line for questions.
spk08: Thank you. To ask a question, you'll need to press star 1 1 on your phone. Please stand by as we compile the Q&A roster. One moment please for our first question. And our first question will come from Toby Sumner of Truist Securities. Your line is open.
spk02: Thank you. I was wondering if you could give us a perspective that you have both from your own business and appetite for marketing spend and sort of pricing As well as the market perspective, we've heard from some other players that everything seems to be a bit more rational with competition down somewhat. Thank you.
spk03: Hi, Toby. Nice to hear from you. Thanks for the question, of course. I would describe the environment as continuing to be competitive. at least through the first three plus weeks of the AEP. It's hard to predict what will happen the remaining four and a half weeks. That said, I would say that looking at things from the eHealth perspective, the team's done a really good job in managing our CAC. And again, you know, Every day is a new adventure. But I attribute that to the good leadership that we've brought on board here in managing our channels as effectively as possible. So rational is all relative. So let's start there. And I think it all depends on how each marketing organization is performing relative to their own goals and objectives. And if they're performing consistent with their goals and objectives, it probably does remain rational. If they're not, they may do irrational things. So let's see how it all plays out through December 7th.
spk02: Sure. So maybe to kind of dig into that from a pricing perspective for out in the market for folks selling leads, have those prices changed? And I know that's not the preponderance of the business, nor the focal point of growth, but that expectations were out in the market.
spk03: You broke up at the end. Can you say the last part of your question again, please?
spk02: Yeah, if we talk about pricing specifically, then it may distill and kind of get around that need for understanding any particular competitor's expectations
spk03: in plans and whether or not they're living up to them or not um you know it's it's let's just say this we we obviously keep a very close eye on what our competitors are doing to the extent that we have that visibility um our channels are a little different we have a very robust online capability our competitors don't necessarily have that same capability so you know, our online channel. You know, we do more, you know, search engine optimization, search engine marketing. We do more of our paid search activities. So, you know, ours is a little different strategy. On the direct mail, it's hard to really, you know, get visibility as to what they may be spending there than what we're spending. But I would say that, you know, we're satisfied where we are to date We're satisfied with what we're spending relative to where we were this time last year. But again, it's a point in time. And so we can't, you know, we don't get too up, we don't get too down. We're just, you know, it's November 7th and we got another 30 days left in the AEP. So it could be a different answer tomorrow, Toby, but that's where we are today.
spk02: You referenced scheduling investor day in early 23. Could you talk, and you also cited the harvestable receivables over the next 12 months or so. Speak to the cash flow position of the company as we get into next year. I know AEP is a big variable in that equation, so the extent to which you can comment on that would be helpful.
spk03: Sure. I'll let Christine talk a little bit more about the cash flow. I would say, you know, at a very general level, we're pleased with where we are from a cash flow perspective. From an investor day, you know, the goal there, of course, is really multidimensional and that we want to present this leadership team to our investors and to analysts share much more about, you know, the longer range strategic objectives for the organization and provide more insight as to how we continue to see this business unfold and where we're going to take the company. And it's a very different company today than it was a year ago. And that will continue to evolve between now and even the time that we, schedule our investor day in late first quarter, early second quarter. Cash flow, I'll ask Christine if she wants to share a little bit more.
spk00: Sure. Thank you, Fran. And nice to talk to you again, Toby. You know, as we've talked about, certainly being cash flow positive is critical to this management team. And that's been one of our goals as we revise our operating plan for 2022 is to really reduce our cash burn. And as part of our revised 22 guidance that we talked about on the Q2 earnings call, we increased our cash flow ranges by 30 million. And then also, as you think about our results for Q3, we're seeing that initial impact from our efforts through those operating cash flows and the outflows improving by 52 million on a year-to-date basis as compared to the first three quarters of 2021. And, you know, as then we think about heading into 2023 and Q1, we will be at a significantly lower cost basis on both the fixed and variable cost side.
spk06: Okay. Thank you very much. Thank you.
spk08: One moment, please, for our next question. Our next question will come from George Hill of Deutsche Bank. Your line is open.
spk01: Hey, good evening, guys, and thanks for taking the questions. I kind of just have two topics I wanted to touch on. So first is you have CMS implementing the advanced marketing rules. I'm sorry, the advanced market recording rules for this year's AEP. I guess, can you talk about what changes that creates For you guys, if any, I mean, I know from the call center business, you guys have always been recording calls, but I don't know if the changes that CMS has implemented has created any changes in your workflow.
spk03: Hi, George. Thanks for the question. It really hasn't changed anything for us. I mean, we've always, you know, recorded calls. Call quality is critically important to us. It's really for beneficiary protection. And it's actually certainly a great tool for us to continue to advance the proficiency of our sales agents. The one nuance I would say this year is that there was a requirement, a disclaimer requirement that we, third-party marketing organizations, were required to, within the first 60 seconds of a call, share with beneficiaries that we don't offer all plans within their geographic area. But it hasn't resulted in any issues for us as far as directing call to CMS. So our conversion rates are higher than they were last year. Our telesales is robust. So we're doing just fine. And our call qualities are very high as well. So no concerns on the CMS side.
spk01: Okay, and then I guess my follow-up would be there's been a little bit of concern at the margin, I guess, that that combined with the changes in the TV marketing ads is likely to drive down churn for this selling season, which I would assume is good for you guys, but could also slow market growth at the margin. So I guess I would just ask, I know we're only a couple weeks in, but maybe kind of do you see anything that could impact the market from a macro level as opposed to anything with e-health specifically?
spk03: Well, I think what you're referring to is the 45-day approval process for TV advertising that CMS imposed the new file in use. But, you know, they have 45 days to review TV commercials that carriers or any marketing organization wants to utilize. We're not utilizing it. direct TV this year, so it doesn't impact us as much as it might impact others. Churn is one of our top priorities, meaning reducing churn, increasing persistency. And I think what CMS has been concerned about are some of the commercials that have featured some celebrities that really is aimed at beneficiaries who might be eligible for a Part B rebate. They promote that and they've watered those down quite a bit because they're only available in a very limited number of geographic areas in the country and I think they were probably over promoted in the past. CMS, to their credit, really got after the organizations to change the way that they were promoted and I think that been a good thing, um, you know, it's not good for the industry to create any kind of messaging that can be easily misinterpreted. So we're, you know, we're very supportive of CMS efforts there to make sure that all communications are done in a way that is a good reflection on, on the industry.
spk01: Okay. I appreciate the color. Thank you. Thank you.
spk08: One moment for our next question. Our next question will come from Ben Hendrix of RBC Capital Markets. Your line is open.
spk04: Thank you very much. I just wanted a quick question, ask a quick question on the $90 million of cost savings this year. It makes sense that the variable costs were mostly accrued to 4Q, but I was wondering if you'd give us some more color on how that's manifesting here in the early weeks of AEP. We're seeing that, for example, an increase to online penetration both in unassisted and mix there in terms of enrollment, kind of just a little bit more color on how that's accruing. Thanks.
spk03: Hi, Dan. Thanks for the question. You know, the cost savings, the cost transformation activities have been across a wide area of activities. I'm going to ask, you know, Christine to join me in this part of our conversation, but we've been at it since April. That's when we first launched our cost transformation initiative. And there's still more opportunities that we've already identified for the balance of this year and certainly into 2023. So, you know, these are efficiencies and they're both fixed and variable opportunities. They're intended to be executed in ways that are really aimed at efficiencies and minimally disruptive in terms of what they mean for the organization and what they mean for certainly our customers, as well as our carrier partners. So as far as assisted and unassisted online, we look at all our channels as equal opportunities to support our growth objectives. We don't favor one over the other. The objective here is to meet customers where they want to be met. And in fact, we've even taken it to new levels by introducing live agent chat. What perhaps was in the past a bias towards unassisted, we can actually improve the throughput on our top of the funnel by having the live agent chat capability. We're here to fork those who are in completed sales And now by having the live chat capability, they're now converted to an assistant. And that was unproductive before, right? Because people weren't completing the transaction because they didn't have the ability to click on for help. And now that changes. So, you know, it's just a different philosophy. Now we, if it increases the, acquisition costs incrementally, so be it. It results in a customer and a customer that we intend to keep for the lifetime. That's the goal. So it's a different philosophy at eHealth today. The platforms, there's other ways to create efficiency. We want that top of the funnel to be a source for lifetime value as for as much of the throughput as possible and by introducing live agent chat we think that there's you know greater opportunity for throughput so christian anything you want to add on the cost efficiency side i think i think you've covered a lot of it fran i think there's a couple of things that i'll mention is as we think about the cost transformation we're looking at all costs both variable and fixed
spk00: On the variable side, certainly that will be the largest portion of our cost reduction for this year. Mainly certainly from lower marketing spend and really focusing on the right channels that are going to provide us that right ROI. And then having that corresponding reduction in the agent headcount to match that on a year over year basis. And then on the fixed side, really looking at all of our fixed expenses and making sure that we have that right cost structure in place and starting 2023 at a better cost basis than we did entering into 2022. And we're continuing to look at additional opportunities, both on the variable as we continue to hone in on what are the right areas of focus, And then on the fixed side as well, you know, one of the things that we mentioned was the Santa Clara lease. So, we did a sublease on one of our office spaces, and that is something, as we have that remote first strategy from a people side, that is an area that we'll continue to look at opportunities as well as other fixed cost expenses.
spk06: Thanks for the color, guys.
spk08: Thank you. And one moment for our next question. Our next question will come from Daniel Grosswhite of Citi. Your line is open.
spk07: Hi, thanks for taking the question. What if your competitors noted that there's more MA plan differential this AEP, which is leading to more shopping? I'm curious if you're seeing the same thing off of your platform and what that may mean for one, to approve policies as AP, and then two, churn in older cohorts and your ability to recapture those seniors.
spk03: Hi, Daniel. Thanks for the question. You know, I don't know if I would refer to it as more plan differential or just greater value proposition, you know, whether it's in the core or in the supplemental plans, but I'd also say there's greater economic pressure In general, just because inflation in America is being felt by those with fixed incomes. So, you know, and I wouldn't focus entirely on those who have an MA plan today, right? Because there's, think about, you know, the 60% of Americans who are in original Medicare or who have original Medicare and have supplemental Medicare. Medicare supplemental that are, you know, shopping for Medicare Advantage because it does provide a much greater value proposition and can reduce the financial exposure that they're subjected to in original Medicare with coinsurance deductibles where they have that protection on a Medicare Advantage plan in large part with a $0 monthly premium. I know there's concern about people switching, and there could be people switching, but they could also be switching and staying with the same carrier because carriers offer multiple plan options in the same geography that doesn't necessarily result in beneficiaries having to switch the relationship with the carrier as well. You know, I just want to provide some perspective there that, first and foremost, those in original Medicare gain a lot of protection by considering a Medicare Advantage alternative. Even those with Medicare Supplemental, oftentimes because they're paying, you know, frequently a pretty high monthly premium. And if they're on a fixed income, that can be challenging, particularly now with higher inflation. But back to your original point about differential, I think it's just a value proposition that's really very, very attractive for American Medicare beneficiaries today. Yeah, makes sense.
spk07: Okay, and then on the ISP segment, the Inflation Reduction Act extended subsidies, ACA subsidies through 2024. I'm just curious, I know you're not you know, overly indexed to the qualified plans. But I'm curious if you think that will translate into faster ISP growth this year and next.
spk03: I don't necessarily think it's going to be accelerated growth. I would call it more moderate growth. That's our thinking right now.
spk06: Got it. Thank you.
spk08: Thank you. And this will end the Q&A portion of the conference. I would now like to turn the conference back to Fran Soisman for closing remarks.
spk03: Thank you, Operator, and thank you all very much for joining us this afternoon. Thanks for your concern. Thank you, Operator.
spk08: This will conclude today's conference call. Thank you all for participating. You may now disconnect and have a pleasant day.
Disclaimer