Big Deals: Healthcare in Banking

• Fiserv Targets Healthcare Banking Market
• Fiserv Acquires Employee Benefits Plan Administrator
• Metavante Signs Reseller Agreement With Siemens
• PwC Partners With Medical Banking Project On HSAs, Healthcare Payments
• Fidelity Information Servics Offers HSA Solution

Fiserv Targets Healthcare Banking Market

Fiserv (Brookfield, Wis.) has developed a comprehensive program of services in the rapidly growing field of healthcare banking, including managing tax-advantaged healthcare accounts for consumers and moving payments between parties in healthcare transactions. Fiserv's goal is to be the leading technology enabler as banks enter the healthcare market through products such as health savings accounts (HSAs).

Fiserv's healthcare banking program includes various health payment solutions, as well as marketing and educational tools designed to help banks understand HSAs and inform their customers. The company will draw upon its history in financial payments processing, as well as its Fiserv Health operating unit.

Fiserv Acquires Employee Benefits Plan Administrator

Fiserv (Brookfield, Wis.) has acquired Administrative Services Group (ASGI; Lexington, Ky.), an employee benefits plan administrator. The purchase of ASGI, which will operate as part of Fiserv Health, will allow the transaction technology provider to expand its share of the health benefits administration market. The purchase price was not disclosed.

Metavante Signs Reseller Agreement With Siemens

Metavante, a subsidiary of Marshall & Ilsley Corp. (Milwaukee), has named Siemens Medical Solutions, a division of Siemens AG (Munich, Germany), as a reseller for its electronic bill publishing and online bill pay products.

Siemens Medical Solutions sells IT solutions to the healthcare industry. The Metavante bill publishing solution creates e-bills and other electronic documents using information from clients' existing systems. The health care provider retains control of the information, branding, and patient relationships.

PwC Partners With Medical Banking Project On HSAs, Healthcare Payments

PricewaterhouseCoopers (New York) has joined with the Medical Banking Project (MBProject; Nashville, Tenn.) to form the HSA Workgroup, an initiative to develop best practices for Health Savings Accounts (HSAs). The HSA Workgroup will create, disseminate, and maintain business rules enabling financial institutions, healthcare providers, payers and their members to communicate and perform healthcare financial transactions in a banking-style environment.

One objective of the HSA Workgroup is to develop the necessary groundwork that will enable patients to walk up to an ATM-style kiosk at a hospital, swipe an insurance identification care with debit card functionality and avoid complex paperwork requirements.

Fidelity Information Servics Offers HSA Solution

Fidelity Information Services (Jacksonville, Fla.), will provide a solution for financial services organizations managing healthcare savings accounts (HSAs). Fidelity's "flexibile deposits" solution will allow HSA funds to be deposited into liquid or longer-term investment accounts, depending on customer needs.