Correlation Factors Related to Customers’ Health Insurance Buying Decision Case Study of Health Insurance Plans of Muangthai Insurance Public Company Limited

Abstract

The objective of this research is to study the factors which related to customers’ health insurance buying decision. The data is drawn from a case study on existing health insurance plans of Muangthai Insurance Public Company Limited which was conducted for the purpose of developing health insurance products that best align with our customers’ needs. The sampling group for this study comprises of ordinary persons, private company employees, government officials, state enterprise employees, etc; who used to buy health insurance a total of 387 persons. The questionnaire used for data collection was disseminated online via Google Form. The statistical tools used for data analysis in this study include calculating frequency distribution, mean, and standard deviation to describe the sampling group and analyzing the relationship between independent and dependent variables with Chi-Square Test and one-way analysis of variance (One-Way ANOVA) at α = 0.05 significance level.

The outcome of this study shows that most questionnaire respondents are married women without children between the ages of 36 - 40 years old, who are currently working as private company employees and have bachelor’s degree as the highest level of education. The average salary of sample is 55,000 THB or higher. Most have access to the government’s social security scheme as part of their employment benefits. Furthermore, the service marketing mix variable deemed most influential (rated as “strongly agree”) for making health insurance buying decision among this group is insurance agents and the insurance services provided. As for the result from hypothesis testing, the following conclusions can be drawn: 1) Age / occupation / marital status / average monthly income and number of children in the family correlate with health insurance selection and buying behaviors under the aspect of the person(s) influencing health insurance buying decision. 2) Occupation/ marital status and average monthly income correlate with health insurance selection and buying behaviors under the aspect of the purpose of health insurance buying and 3) Average monthly income correlates with health insurance selection and buying behaviors under the aspect of the amount of insurance premium.  As for the result from one-way ANOVA on health insurance selection and buying behaviors under the aspect of person(s) influencing health insurance buying decision at statistical significance of 0.05, the opinions on the service marketing mix variables among the sampling group were not different.

From the study, the most important single factor that can influence customers’ health insurance buying decision is the insurance agents and the insurance services provided, which include but does not limited to insurance agents being responsible and proactive in protecting customer’s interests, insurance agents being honest and reliable, and the insurance claim process being simple and expeditious, etc.