Epic River has introduced a new platform designed to connect credit unions with healthcare providers, opening up new avenues for financing in the healthcare sector. This innovative approach aims to benefit both credit unions and healthcare providers by offering a simplified and streamlined lending process. For healthcare providers, this platform can provide a much-needed source of reliable cash flow through patient loans. This can be particularly beneficial for smaller practices or those facing financial challenges. On the other hand, credit unions can tap into a new source of high-quality loans, potentially expanding their portfolio and increasing interest income opportunities. Epic River's solution focuses on making the lending process more accessible and efficient. By facilitating loans between credit unions and healthcare providers, the platform indirectly supports patients by offering them more manageable payment options for medical bills. This new platform could mark a significant shift in healthcare financing, demonstrating the potential of collaboration between financial institutions and healthcare providers. As the healthcare landscape continues to evolve, innovative solutions like this could play a crucial role in ensuring financial sustainability and accessibility for all stakeholders.

The U.S. is facing a medical debt crisis, with 41% of adults owing money for healthcare. Many feel hopeless about ever paying it off. However, a Colorado-based company, Epic River, has an innovative solution. Epic River partners with credit unions to take on unpaid medical bills from hospitals. Surprisingly, the credit union takes on zero risk, even without checking borrowers' credit scores. If a debt seems unlikely to be repaid, it's returned to the hospital. This model seems too good to be true, but it works. The credit union's default rate is only 7%, meaning 93% of debtors are making payments. This success is partly because many debtors have good credit scores and want to avoid damaging their financial standing. This unique approach to medical debt relief offers hope for both healthcare providers and patients. To learn more, listen to the CU 2.0 podcast episode featuring Epic River's CEO and the Chief Lending Officer of Clarity Credit Union. It's a financial innovation you won't want to miss!

In an era of evaporating deposits, community banks find themselves at a pivotal crossroads. As the dust has settled from a tumultuous first half of this year, financial institutions are looking to learn from others' mistakes. Bank boards have taken action to improve interest rate resiliency and leadership teams have identified areas ripe for efficiency improvement but the area still in dire need of innovation is deposit account identification and capture. This begs the question: Are community banks tapping into the right customer base? Is there an opportunity to solve a market problem that could, in turn, solve one of banking's biggest problems?

In the ever-changing landscape of healthcare economics, there has been a disproportionate increase in hospitals' bad debt. Over the past three years, hospitals are grappling with over 45% surge1 in bad debt stemming from self-pay patients post adjudication (11% in 2018 to over 57% in 2021).

As technology continues to shape the way we conduct our financial transactions, it's becoming increasingly clear that FinTechs and online lenders are challenging the traditional model of banking. However, community banks are not sitting idle in the face of this disruption. Instead, they are embracing BankTech partnerships to leverage their current suite of services and stay ahead of the curve.