United Health Care and U Card

[StevenL650610]

Hi, for those who have United Health Care and the U Card.

Which plan do you have and how much per month/quarter do you get loaded onto your U card?

Also, have you been able to walk into a Walmart or Target and buy almost anything? 

Thank you.

[jp24914303]

My wife and I both use the Ucard to get $10 per month credits for walking. In the past we could get Amazon gift cards at the end of the year and it worked perfectly. Now it seems you have to shop at Walmart and the experience has been horrifying. The items we scan all show not eligible at our walmart. I went online to see what is eligible and it's all junk food we don't eat. I feel this program is useless to us now and all incentive is gone. Time to shop for another plan.

[SusanE71261]

I thought I should update this discussion with something I found about the OTC benefits and eligibility of items. This might help explain my experience at Walmart I covered in a previous post. I found quite by accident that if you scan the UPC code on some items it will say it is eligible for purchase but only using your general rewards balance on your U-card. items that are actually for purchase on the OTC balance will show they can be purchased with either the OTC balance or Rewards balance.

With this knowledge I was able to go to Walmart and successfully use my spouse's OTC balance on eligible items without have to use any of his general Rewards balance. It is interesting to note that none of the 4 or 5 UHC customer service reps I spoke with were aware of this issue. I found it only by playing around with the app and finding items that scanned as eligible for purchase but not with the OTC credit.

[myaktieen]

Hello, 

I am member of UHC since 2019 and I do have the U card that was started this year. I do have  a question about the card, who should I go to to ask a question about the U card? I called the nmber on my card but they did not have an answer for my question.

[SusanE71261]

Yes, I use my Rewards benefits. We both get the $10/ month reward for walking 5000 steps for 10 days. I can almost get that from normal daily activities if I carry my phone. So far this year I have earned at least $100 from getting my annual physical, flu shot, etc. I have used the card at both Walmart and Publix.

My experience using the OTC benefit at Walmart is mixed. I first scan the bar code on the item using the scanner in the app to see if it is eligible. We used to use the online catalog to order but found the items are over priced and often out of stock. 

Last week I went to Walmart and spent over an hour picking out items I could use and scanning eligible items. My purchases totaled $69.88 so they should have all come out of the $70 OTC benefit for this quarter. When I paid using my U-Card I found that only around $50 came from my OTC credit and the rest was deducted from my Rewards benefit. I had no way of knowing this would happen and I am positive every item I bought scanned as eligible. I have also found they exclude economy sized items and twin packs on things like Vitamin C, 81 mg aspirin etc. even when the smaller size is eligible.

I used the chat help on the UHC web site and they were useless. I had asked them to move money from my OTC balance over to my rewards balance. They said they could not do that and said I needed to call Healthy Benefits Plus who administers the program. I waited on hold for 20 minutes and gave up.

I tried the contact link on the web site and exchanged some emails with them. I even scanned a copy of the Walmart receipt and sent it to them. After that they referred me back to the 800 number again that never answers. Grrr!!

I think the bottom line is UHC goes out of their way to try to make it difficult to use the Rewards benefits. You used to be able to buy Amazon gift cards with the debit card. You cannot do that now. They U-Card is difficult to use at self check out lanes. I usually have to get help to get the darn thing to work.