In early December 2022, Tideland received its first phone call from a member who was enrolled in UnitedHealthcare’s Medicare Advantage plan. The member asked if the co-op accepted payments via UnitedHealthcare’s UCard program. We soon learned that other utilities were fielding similar phone calls so we reached out to UnitedHealthcare to learn more.

According to the company, the UCard can be used when participants:

• Visit a provider like your Primary Care Provider or dentist
• Fill a prescription
• Check in at the gym
• Buy healthy food and over-the-counter products
• Pay utility bills
• Spend earned rewards

The program is scheduled to begin in January 2023. Tideland can process payments from any card issuer connected to the VISA, MasterCard or American Express networks.

If the UCard is not associated with one of those networks and you choose to make a UCard payment via a third-party payment processing vendor like Walmart, please take into account that it can take up to seven or more business days for the payment to be received by Tideland. Therefore, if you are past due on your electric account or within a week or two of your due date, you may want to avoid the use of a third party vendor.