Is there a rating for “sucked”?

By Susan Saldibar

As you know, Steve Moran conducts interviews for his Conversations video series. Recently, though, he got the tables turned on him. Darren Mathis, Founder and CEO of LincWare (a Senior Housing Forum partner) had heard about Steve’s experience with the admissions process at an assisted living community a few years ago. He wanted to know more. The result is a really interesting video, which you can see at the bottom of the article.

LincWare, for those of you who may not know, is the developer of Admit+, the digital admissions platform that got a lot of attention recently as the technology behind Sunrise Senior Living’s McKnight’s Award for Excellence. The platform has been reported to have boiled down hours of admissions paperwork to about 15 minutes. Pretty impressive.

“It was ‘check this box, sign this, check that box’ over and over again.”

Darren asked Steve to share with readers the admissions experience he had a few years ago with a small, independent assisted living community he had selected for his mom after she suffered a stroke. Although the community experience turned out to be great, the process of completing all the paperwork for admissions was, according to Steve, not so great.

It all started innocently enough. The owner told Steve, “We’ll get your mom settled and, by the way, we have some paperwork.” Turned out to be an understatement. They proceeded to slide over to Steve a stack of forms about 2-3 inches deep! “It was ‘check this box, sign this, check that box’ over and over again,” Steve tells Darren. “I must have put my name and my mom’s name on 20-30 forms!”

“Is there a rating for ‘sucked’?”

Darren asked Steve if he felt confident that he had actually signed everything. Even though the sales counselor had yellow highlighted items requiring Steve’s signature, he didn’t feel totally confident. “Maybe I checked everything, but I wasn’t sure. If you went back and looked, I’m sure there was something I didn’t check.”

“Hmm. Maybe an auditor found it instead,” Darren remarked. No kidding. And we all know what happens then!

So, what was the feeling Steve walked away with that day? “Frustration,” he told Darren. “And, I’m in this business, so I’m not even typical.” Asked how he would rate the process, from 1-4, Steve joked, “Is there a rating for ‘sucked’?”

“You’re making the industry better.”

Darren told Steve that, typically, especially in larger communities, the executive team often doesn’t fully realize what the residents are experiencing. “Brand damage can occur when you have super frustrated residents,” Darren says. “And they talk the most within their first 30 days as a customer. Is that what communities want that first experience to be? Senior level people often miss this!”

Steve agrees and is glad to see organizations like LincWare working to improve the resident experience on the front end, plus protecting the community by having all their i’s dotted and t’s crossed. “You’re making the industry better,” he told Darren.

You can check out the full podcast below.

For more information about Admit+ and how they are improving the admissions process for senior living communities, you can visit their website:

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