One particular clinic in Singapore that’s situated in Punggol, called Zenith Medical Clinic, allows patients to pay in digital currencies such as Bitcoin and Ether for medical treatments. Customers can pay an equivalent value depending on the current market value of the digital token used.
The doctors who run the clinic — brothers Dr Paul Ang Teng Soon and Dr Ang Kai Kok — first introduced cryptocurrencies as a mode of payment four years ago, after gaining an interest in digital tokens.
According to Dr Paul Ang, a perk of accepting cryptocurrency payments is that the clinic does not have to pay for the service to be used, while credit card companies may charge up to two per cent per in fees of each transaction, an additional cost that will be passed on to customers in the future.
To date, less than 0.1 per cent of patients have paid in cryptocurrency, of which majority are foreigners between 30 and 40 years old. Despite the lacklustre reception, Dr Ang remains optimistic that more people would be more receptive of digital currencies when the values increase in the future.
Another healthcare centre that has accepted cryptocurrency payments is Royal Healthcare, which partnered with dtcpay at the start of the year to process crypto payments.
According to the Payment Services Act, businesses can accept digital token payments (DTPs) as payments, provided that they are licensed and regulated, and that the risks of using cryptocurrencies are disclosed to customers.
Patients who use DTPs as payments would also need to be aware of price fluctuation risks, with clinics providing full transparency should prices change according to the value of the digital tokens.
Featured Image Credit: Zenith Medical Center / HP