Gewardz Health is based in Banbridge Co.Down and is a healthcare solutions provider established in 2019, originally focused on delivering enterprise-quality reward and retention programs to small and medium-sized businesses (SMEs) traditionally underserved by mainstream providers. In response to client needs for affordable and accessible healthcare, Gewardz Health evolved in late 2022 to develop a dedicated digital health platform—officially launching its healthcare arm in 2023. The platform offers unlimited online GP appointments, counselling, and wellbeing services for less than one hour’s wages per employee each month. Gewardz Health’s vision is to make essential healthcare both accessible and affordable for all SME employees, with a broader mission to help eliminate preventable health inequalities in underserved and diverse communities throughout Ireland.
- What is Gewardz Health, how long has it been in operation and what’s its vision?
Gewardz was launched in 2019 to bring enterprise quality solutions to SME businesses, deemed by the service providers to be too small, to have access to these services so that they could reward, retain, recruit and compete for staff and customers. Originally, we started as an outsourced reward management platform. Activities we still do today. In late 2022, a client of ours asked us to advise and help with staff retention and recruitment and we suggested bringing in a healthcare benefit. Their initial response was that Health insurance is too expensive. When we explained that large organisations have access to healthcare solutions that don’t require the full cost of insurance, they wanted us to create a similar solution for them. Hence Gewardz Health was conceived.
We spent 2023 building the platform which offers our clients access to Unlimited GP appointments, Counselling services and other wellbeing supports for less than one hour’s wages per month per employee.
While we started with the aim of creating a health and wellbeing service that EVERY business could afford to offer their staff, we have evolved our vision is help eliminate preventable health inequality in under-served communities.
- How does your platform address the unique healthcare challenges faced by underrepresented groups within Irish SMEs?
70% of workers in Irish do not have any employer-sponsored healthcare benefits. At a time when “Squeezed Middle” Ireland (those who earn too much for free GPs but not enough to afford health insurance premiums) are experiencing increasing cost of living challenges, there is a need for businesses to consider how they can or should be supporting their people beyond salaries.
As part of our recognition to support SMEs, during 2024, we became the Healthcare provider to the Small Firms Association Member Benefits program. Since then, we have expanded our collaborations to include with the Progressive College Network, a network of 10 English language colleges based around Ireland, offering our services to their International Students who come to Ireland to learn but end up in A&E when they need prescriptions.
We recently launched an initiative with Cora Barnes and her team in 3Q recruitment to offer our healthcare solution to their Temp contracting staff to recognise and reward their loyalty.
We are about to embark on a JV with a Brazilian healthcare platform to provide our solution to their international Diaspora in Ireland and the UK, most of whom simply cannot get access to GP appointments when they come here to work.
Finally, we have just teamed up with Angela Canavan and her team at Canavan Byrne to look at how we can help serve the early learning and childcare industry for both employers and parents alike.
- How does Gewardz Health ensure its healthcare services are accessible and inclusive for employees from diverse backgrounds, including those with disabilities or language barriers?
We have built a very easy to use digital platform that allows members book GP appointments and access other wellbeing services without the need for form filling or having to share invasive information prior to consultations. Appointments are available online or by telephone 7 days a week from 8am to 10pm, with the next available appointments (usually same day) visible on our app.
This means that members can chose the time that suits them best to have their consultation from the comfort of their home (or office). As all our GPs are HSE registered (this is important), generally our appointments do require a level of English. We are currently exploring how we can make our app more inclusive and remain open to suggestions from our partners. For example we are currently looking ah how we can add additional languages to our service over the coming months.
- Can you share examples of how Gewardz Health has supported SMEs in implementing equitable healthcare benefits for all staff, regardless of role or contract type?
Given the costs associated with health insurance, we find from discussions with prospective employers, they tend to tier healthcare access based on tenure or seniority. Given that we charge less than one hour’s wages per month for employees (and their household family members) to access our services, we are seeing our clients offer the solution across all their staff, irrespective of their roles in the organisations.
One of the biggest challenges our clients are facing is with respect to their international workers who cannot get access to GPs. Given Irelands population has grown to over 7m in the last 36 months, this is an area which is likely to become more critical for employers.
To reiterate and give special mention to 3Q Recruitment have gone above and beyond by offering our services to their temporary workers. A sector of the working population that gets very much overlooked. We’ve also work with childcare centres and cleaning firms, where full-time, part-time, and relief staff all get equal access to our care packages—regardless of role, hours, or contract.
- Often childcare impacts females rather than males in a relationship. Do you have any data to back this claim up and how are you going about addressing this?
Yes—CSO data and ESRI studies consistently show that 64% of the time, it is the mothers who are more likely to take time off when a child or parent is unwell.In crèches, for example, when a child is sick, the knock-on effect of having drop everything to take the child out of the creche can have major impact on the mothers in the household.
Gewardz Health aims to reduce some of this pressure by offering same day access to online GP consultations, to help reduce the healing time and get the child back into the creche sooner. By being available from 8am to 10pm 7 days a week, the world doesn’t stop at 6pm on a Friday. As an example of this, one of my own children came to my wife with an infected finger on a Saturday morning at 8.30am. My wife was concerned that if she didn’t get an anti-biotic over the weekend, she could end up in A&E. By going on our app, she had a GP appointment by 9.30 am and picked up a prescription at the pharmacy by 10.30. The outcome was our youngest child was in school on the Monday morning.
By making our service available to all household members, we are helping to normalise family access for both parents, not just the “default caregiver” by making the booking process simple.
- How do you ensure that your mental health and advisory services are sensitive to the needs of minority and marginalised communities?
We deliver our mental health services through trained counsellors who are culturally competent, trauma-informed, and trained to handle issues like immigration stress, financial hardship, discrimination, and more. Our anonymous platform also reduces stigma, allowing users—especially from minority backgrounds—to seek help in a safe space. Additionally, we offer legal and debt advice through trusted providers who understand the socioeconomic challenges these groups face.
- How does Gewardz Health measure the impact and well-being across diverse SME workforces?
For a start, SME workforces find themselves excluded from services that provide real value to as much of the workforce as possible and so we are tearing down these barriers. Secondly there is a significant challenge around trust by the workforce when services are provided by their employers. Within the wellbeing marketplace, employee take-up ranges from 0.8% to 1.8%.
For Gewardz Health, our monthly utilisation rate averages around 12%. At some point everyone needs a GP, and we see this in the range of users making online appointments. We measure whether users are male or female and their age demographic, but we deliberately keep the user data anonymous. We want to ensure employees are confident in using our services and trust in what we do.
- What partnerships or collaborations has Gewardz Health formed to enhance DEI outcomes for SMEs, such as with advocacy groups or community organisations?
We’ve partnered with the Small Firms Association (SFA) to offer our services to SMEs across Ireland. We’re also working with Canavan Byrne to support early years educators, and 3Q Recruitment to ensure temporary and gig workers aren’t excluded from healthcare benefits. We work with charities who are looking for a way to offer their staff additional benefits within their significant budget constraints, and we continually look to work with “under-served” communities so that we can give access to urgent care when it is needed most.
- Looking ahead, how is Gewardz Health planning to expand or adapt its services to better support diversity, equity, and inclusion in the SME sector in Ireland?
We’re continually researching the market to expand our offering to include health and wellbeing solutions that will serve as many of our members as possible. We don’t exclude any business (regardless of size) nor to we exclude any nationality and actively look to help service “under-served” communities. We’re also developing an onboarding toolkit for SMEs to help them promote inclusive healthcare benefits during recruitment—especially for roles traditionally overlooked by mainstream health plans. Our upcoming US and UK expansion is being built around diaspora-linked SMEs, ensuring Irish values of care travel globally.
- Are there any other people, companies or programmes in Ireland that you are big fans of?
Absolutely. We admire:
- Platform 55 – Championing the female journey and gender pay gap equality.
- Small Firms Association – for nurturing SME businesses and championing their cause with government
- 3Q Recruitment – for walking the talk on fair access to healthcare for all workers.
We believe that meaningful change comes from collaboration, not competition—and we’re proud to be part of that ecosystem.