Employers have been warned against failing to register their employees for the Social Health Authority as the rollout of the new fund enters its second week.
Principal Secretary in the State Department for Medical Services, Harry Kimtai revealed on Wednesday, October 8 that employees who self-registered for the SHA would be unable to access medical services if their employers were yet to declare them.
“We urge Human Resource Practitioners to declare their employees on the employers portal to guarantee their eligibility to benefit under the Social Health Authority. Employees who are not declared cannot access services even if they have self-registered” PS Kimtai said.
The latest update provided some clarity on the new system, amid several challenges and grey areas from the public about registration.
The Ministry of Health confirmed at least 12.7 million Kenyans were registered under SHA, while 1442 healthcare providers have been contracted to offer services under SHA.
The bigger picture: After the Court of Appeal upheld the three Acts namely Social Health Insurance Act, Primary Health Care Act and Digital Health Act, employers were required to comply with the requirements to register with the Social Health Authority (SHA) and make contributions to the SHIF.
On October 1, the first date of the transition to SHIF, a public notice from the Ministry of Health shifted the registration obligation from employees to their employers.
How to declare employees: As per the Ministry, an employer can declare an employee by entering the NHIF byproduct portal username and password. The system will then pull the employer's NHIF details, and prompt the employer to upload their business registration and KRA PIN certificate.
Once details of the contact person have been entered and the record saved, the system will send an email to allow the user to set a new password. After a successful login, the employer is required to upload the byproduct file with the employee details.
If an employee is already registered, their CR number will be sent back, allowing the user to generate the by-product reference number in readiness to make the payment.
Salaried employees are typically expected to contribute at a rate is 2.75% of the gross salary with a minimum contribution of Ksh 300. There is no maximum limit.
