Telehealth demand can grow faster than a patient support team can scale. As call and message volumes increase, internal teams can quickly fall behind on callbacks, scheduling, and other patient requests. Hiring and training healthcare support staff also takes time, while seasonal enrollment periods and product launches create additional spikes in demand.
That is why many digital health companies turn to a healthcare BPO partner instead of building their support teams entirely in-house. Outsourcing often makes it easier to scale staffing and maintain coverage, but it doesn’t shift accountability to the provider. You’re still responsible for the service levels, quality, and HIPAA compliance. The difference is that you manage those responsibilities through a partner’s workforce rather than your own.
This guide covers eight healthcare BPO providers worth considering in 2026, along with the key factors to take into account when comparing them.
Without further ado, let’s dive right in.
What healthcare BPO covers in telehealth?
Healthcare BPO involves outsourcing non-clinical operations to an external provider. In telehealth, these operations include appointment scheduling, insurance and eligibility verification, prior authorization, technical support for virtual care platforms, post-visit follow-up, prescription refill coordination, billing support, back-office records management, and more. Clinical decisions remain with licensed healthcare professionals.
This distinction is important when deciding what work can be outsourced and where it can be performed. Administrative work can often be handled by offshore or nearshore teams, while roles that require a professional license, such as clinical or insurance sales roles, may be subject to jurisdiction-specific requirements that affect where agents can be based and what services they can provide.
Why patient support has become a workforce problem?
Telehealth has become a lasting part of healthcare rather than fading away after the pandemic. According to the CDC’s National Center for Health Statistics, 80% of US office-based physicians used telemedicine in 2024. That was down from 86.5% in 2021, but still more than five times the 15.4% recorded in 2019. Virtual care is no longer an experiment. It is an established channel that requires ongoing staffing and support.
Policy changes have also made it easier for healthcare organizations to plan around telehealth. The Consolidated Appropriations Act of 2026, signed in February 2026, extended Medicare telehealth flexibilities through December 31, 2027, according to the US Department of Health and Human Services. Patients can receive non-behavioral telehealth services at home without geographic restrictions, and audio-only delivery remains permitted. This additional visibility gives organizations enough time to build a more sustainable operating model rather than relying on another round of temporary contractors.
Where that demand is concentrated creates another staffing challenge. NCHS data shows that telemedicine use in non-metropolitan areas fell from 83.3% to 60.9% between 2021 and 2024. In metropolitan areas, use declined from 86.7% to 81.0% over the same period. The much steeper decline in non-metropolitan areas can make demand less predictable for rural programs, which often operate with smaller teams. That makes fixed in-house headcount harder to manage when demand fluctuates.
Seven criteria for evaluating healthcare BPO providers
When comparing healthcare BPO providers, compliance certifications and language coverage are important, but they do not tell you everything about how a provider will perform. Look at the following factors to understand how well a partner can support your operations over time.
- Quality assurance coverage. Ask what percentage of interactions the provider reviews. Traditional programs may sample only 2% to 5% of calls, leaving many quality issues undetected. Providers that use AI to review every interaction can identify compliance risks and coaching opportunities in real time.
- Agent retention on healthcare accounts. Contact center attrition can range from 30% to 45% annually. Every departure creates additional recruiting, training, and ramp-up work as a replacement learns your processes. Ask for the attrition rate on comparable healthcare programs rather than relying on the provider’s overall company average.
- Ramp speed. Enrollment periods and product launches can create sudden increases in demand. Ask how quickly a provider can recruit, train, and deploy additional agents, particularly if your business experiences seasonal spikes.
- Dedicated teams versus shared pools. Dedicated agents assigned to your account can build deeper knowledge of your workflows and maintain more consistent access to PHI. Shared teams may cost less, but agents are typically less familiar with an individual client’s processes.
- Audited certifications. HIPAA compliance is a basic requirement. Certifications such as SOC 2 Type II, ISO 27001, and HITRUST provide additional evidence that an external auditor has assessed the provider’s controls rather than relying solely on the provider’s own claims.
- Actionable reporting. Look for reporting on adherence, occupancy, average handle time, first-contact resolution, and QA scores at the agent level, with data refreshed daily. Monthly summary reports can make it harder to identify and address problems quickly.
- Coverage model and time zones. A partner that provides overnight coverage from a single location may have limited redundancy. Ask how the provider handles regional outages, holidays, and other situations that could affect coverage or increase demand.
Top 8 healthcare BPO companies for telehealth and patient support
The providers below are ranked based on their fit for telehealth and patient-facing support, rather than revenue or overall company size. Some are much larger than others, but scale is not necessarily an advantage for every type of healthcare operation.
1. Helpware CX
Helpware CX provides HIPAA-compliant patient support for telehealth platforms, payers, and provider groups, combining trained agents with AI for routine contacts. The company operates across 19 locations on four continents and supports more than 45 languages. It reports 90% CSAT and an average client partnership of five years, which is roughly three times the typical BPO tenure.
Its healthcare services include appointment scheduling, insurance and eligibility verification, prior authorization, prescription refill support, remote patient monitoring, virtual care coordination, and digital triage. AI-powered quality assurance reviews 100% of calls and written interactions in real time and can flag potential compliance risks and coaching opportunities. Named healthcare clients include Headspace and HealthComp. Teams can scale from 10 to 200 agents in about two weeks.
For organizations with changing demand, the short ramp time can be particularly useful. It can allow a company to add support capacity for enrollment periods or product launches without maintaining the additional headcount after demand falls.
Best for: Mid-market telehealth and digital health companies that need compliant, multilingual coverage without the longer procurement process often associated with large enterprise providers.
Watch for: Helpware operates across four divisions covering CX, AI, software, and marketing, which can make bundled services a natural fit. If you only need inbound voice support, define the scope carefully so you are paying for the services you actually need.
2. Sagility
Sagility focuses exclusively on healthcare. The company provides claims and membership operations, payment integrity, clinical services, and member and provider engagement for health plans. It states that it supports six of the top 10 US health plans and has more than 40,000 employees across five countries.
Its services also cover areas such as appeals and grievances, utilization management, provider credentialing, and payment recovery. Sagility provides clinician-led services as well, which can be useful when member interactions require clinical expertise that a general support agent cannot provide.
Best for: Payers, third-party administrators, and pharmacy benefit managers with regulated member operations.
Watch for: Sagility has a strong focus on payer operations. Consumer telehealth brands looking for a more specialized patient experience model may find the broader healthcare-services approach more than they need.
3. Sutherland Healthcare
Sutherland has more than 38 years of healthcare experience and employs more than 5,000 healthcare specialists across 15 or more global locations, serving 75+ clients. Its healthcare practice focuses on patient access services such as registration, scheduling, eligibility verification, and prior authorization, with the goal of reducing front-end denials.
Sutherland operates an NCQA-certified and URAC-accredited credentialing verification organization and holds HITRUST i1 certification on several platforms, including SmartCred and SmartHealthAnalytics. This makes the provider particularly relevant for organizations dealing with patient access issues related to registration and eligibility data.
Best for: Provider groups and health systems looking to improve patient access and reduce revenue loss associated with front-end process issues.
Watch for: Sutherland combines technology with services, so the model may be a better fit for organizations that want to use its tooling. Companies looking only for staff augmentation may get less value from the broader offering.
4. TTEC
TTEC provides patient access, patient management and engagement, care management, revenue cycle, and provider services for payers and providers. It also supports licensed agent programs, making it an option for enrollment periods when certain calls must be handled by licensed staff.
Its published results provide several performance benchmarks. A GE Healthcare program reached a 93% quality score with a 0.03% error rate after a curriculum rebuild. In another healthcare engagement, a back-office team in India reduced a client’s backlog by 77%, resulting in $710,000 in savings. TTEC also uses AI to review 100% of interactions rather than relying only on a QA sample.
Best for: Health plans and carriers that need licensed agents at scale for AEP, OEP, and special enrollment periods.
Watch for: Enterprise programs can take longer to launch, so allow sufficient time for onboarding and training if you are working toward a fixed enrollment period.
5. Concentrix
Concentrix serves healthcare payers, providers, medtech, and healthtech companies through a combination of CX consulting and omnichannel operations. Its global scale allows it to support multi-country and multilingual programs and handle volumes that may be difficult for smaller providers to accommodate.
The consulting offering can also be useful when the challenge extends beyond staffing. For example, if patient interactions are spread across separate scheduling tools, portals, and contact centers, a broader redesign may address the underlying process issues rather than simply adding more agents.
Best for: Large providers and payers that are modernizing multiple patient or member journeys at the same time.
Watch for: Traditional contracting structures and longer commitments may be less suitable for teams looking for month-to-month flexibility.
6. Foundever
Foundever employs roughly 150,000 associates supporting more than 800 brands. Its healthcare practice provides both licensed and unlicensed agents to payers, providers, pharmaceutical companies, medical device manufacturers, and health technology companies.
The company places significant emphasis on compliance training. Its programs include classroom instruction, AI simulators, and gamified micro-learning, along with internal audits against client-specific controls and real-time compliance alerts through an agent-assist system. Its workforce management tools also support scheduling during periods of higher and lower demand. Foundever holds HITRUST e1 certification for its Oneteam collaboration platform.
Best for: Organizations with significant seasonal demand that need to increase and reduce staffing as volumes change.
Watch for: Its enterprise-oriented model may be more than a smaller organization, such as a wellness app, needs.
7. TaskUs
TaskUs focuses on digital-native healthcare companies, including telehealth platforms, wellness apps, and health technology companies. Its services include patient scheduling, ongoing engagement, post-visit follow-up, billing support, prior authorization, insurance verification, records management, and provider credentialing.
The company has developed operations supporting GLP-1 programs, where signup volumes can increase quickly and gaps between prescription and fulfillment can affect retention. TaskUs also combines analytics with AI-supported quality assurance, which can suit digital health companies that regularly adjust and improve their support operations.
Best for: Venture-backed digital health brands that are growing faster than their internal hiring plans.
Watch for: Confirm the scope of HIPAA coverage and any related attestations for your specific program rather than assuming that all services are covered in the same way.
8. Access Healthcare
Access Healthcare specializes in revenue cycle management, including medical billing, coding, accounts receivable, and denial prevention for health systems, physician practices, and billing companies. The firm scored 91 overall in the KLAS 2024 Ambulatory Revenue Cycle Services report, the highest result among participating organizations.
KLAS also reported that every healthcare leader surveyed said they would repurchase Access Healthcare services and agreed that the company avoids overcharging for add-ons. These results point to a combination of service quality and pricing discipline that may be particularly relevant for organizations evaluating RCM providers.
Best for: Ambulatory groups and billing companies where revenue cycle performance and cash collection are the primary concerns.
Watch for: Access Healthcare is primarily an RCM provider, so patient experience and general patient support are not the central focus of its offering.
Healthcare BPO comparison at a glance
| Provider | Core strength | Best fit | Proof point |
|---|---|---|---|
| Helpware CX | HIPAA-compliant patient support combining human agents with advanced AI solutions | Mid-market telehealth and digital health | 90% CSAT, 19 locations, 45+ languages, five-year average partnership |
| Sagility | Healthcare-only BPO services for payers | Health plans and PBMs | Supports six of the top ten US health plans |
| Sutherland Healthcare | Patient access, scheduling, and denial prevention | Provider groups and health systems | 5,000+ healthcare specialists and an NCQA-certified, URAC-accredited CVO |
| TTEC | Licensed agent programs and enrollment support at scale | Payers running AEP and OEP | 93% quality score on a GE Healthcare program |
| Concentrix | CX consulting and omnichannel operations at a global scale | Multi-journey modernization programs | Payer, provider, medtech, and healthtech experience |
| Foundever | Seasonal staffing with licensed and unlicensed agents | Open enrollment surges | 150,000 associates supporting more than 800 brands |
| TaskUs | Digital-first support for healthtech and wellness platforms | Fast-growing digital health brands | Telehealth scheduling, prior authorization, and credentialing services |
| Access Healthcare | Revenue cycle management expertise | Ambulatory RCM and billing | Score of 91 in the KLAS 2024 Ambulatory RCM Services report |
What to monitor after launch?
Signing the contract is only the beginning. Once the outsourced team is up and running, you still need to monitor performance just as you would with an in-house team. The right metrics can help you identify staffing, quality, and service issues before they affect the patient experience.
- Adherence and shrinkage. These metrics show whether agents are actually available when they are scheduled to work, particularly during periods of peak demand. Low availability can quickly affect service levels.
- First-contact resolution. A decline in first-contact resolution can point to gaps in the knowledge base, training issues, or increased agent turnover. Look for changes over time rather than evaluating the metric in isolation.
- Quality assurance scores. The distribution of QA scores can be more informative than the average alone. For example, a team with an average score of 92% may still have individual agents scoring as low as 70%, which could indicate a quality or compliance issue that needs attention.
- Agent tenure. Review the average tenure of agents working on your account at least quarterly. Increasing turnover can eventually affect service quality and CSAT as new agents take time to learn your processes.
You should also have clear access to the people and data you need to manage the program. Ask for named points of contact, direct access to your team lead, and daily performance data that your team can access directly rather than receiving only through periodic reports.
Choosing the right healthcare BPO provider
No single provider is the right fit for every healthcare organization. The best choice depends on your staffing needs, the type of support you provide, and the complexity of your operations. For example, health plans that need licensed agents during enrollment periods may benefit from providers such as TTEC, Foundever, or Sagility. Telehealth and digital health companies that need flexible, multilingual support may be better suited to providers such as Helpware CX or TaskUs. Organizations focused primarily on revenue cycle management may find a more specialized provider such as Access Healthcare to be a better fit.
Start by identifying the specific operational needs you want the provider to address, then evaluate each provider against those requirements. Once the partnership is in place, manage it with the same level of attention you would give an internal team. Your patients will experience the service the same way, regardless of who employs the agents.
Frequently asked questions
What is healthcare BPO?
Healthcare BPO is business process outsourcing for healthcare organizations. It involves delegating non-clinical work such as patient support, appointment scheduling, insurance verification, medical billing, claims processing, and data entry to a specialized external provider, allowing internal staff to focus on care delivery.
Is outsourced patient support HIPAA compliant?
It can be, as long as the arrangement is structured and managed appropriately. The provider should sign a business associate agreement, use role-based access controls, maintain audit trails, encrypt PHI both in transit and at rest, and train all agents who handle health information. You can also ask for a SOC 2 Type II report as independent evidence of the provider’s controls rather than relying only on its compliance claims.
How much does healthcare BPO cost?
Pricing depends on factors such as the type of agents you need, coverage hours, languages, and licensing requirements. Most enterprise providers offer custom pricing. At the smaller end of the market, published rates for dedicated teams can start at around $11 per hour per agent. Licensed clinical or insurance agents typically cost considerably more than administrative support staff.
How long does it take to launch an outsourced patient support team?
Launch times can range from about two weeks to a full quarter. Smaller providers offering dedicated teams may be able to deploy 10 to 20 agents within two to three weeks. Enterprise programs that involve licensed agents, EHR integration, and formal security reviews commonly take 60 to 120 days.
Should telehealth companies outsource patient support or hire in-house?
Outsourcing can make sense when demand is seasonal, when you need coverage across time zones or languages that are difficult to staff internally, or when compliant hiring cannot keep up with your growth. Keeping support in-house may be a better option when call volume is steady, support is a core part of the product experience, or agents need to make clinical judgments that the provider cannot handle.
