Which insurance payers Valian can verify

Valian verifies eligibility with hundreds of dental and medical payers in real time through a national clearinghouse connection, the same kind of network your billing team already relies on. That covers the carriers you see every day and the long tail of regional, Medicaid and employer plans, so most patients are verified within seconds of their card being entered.

Valian checks US carriers only. Canadian plans can't be checked today.

How the right payer gets picked

Every carrier has a unique payer ID: the routing address the check is sent to. You never type it. When you add a card or press Edit on Plan basics, you pick the carrier from a list. Typing filters the list, and the carriers your office takes (from Settings › Insurance) show first. Each name in the list already carries the right payer ID, so the check goes to the right place.

Because the list is keyed on the payer, not just the brand name, it tells apart plans that share a parent company. Many carriers are split into separate companies by state (Delta Dental alone is dozens of them), so pick the exact name printed on the card. In a bulk list, a carrier name that doesn't match exactly one company turns red and asks you to pick it, see Red boxes in a bulk list.

Real-time for most, flagged for the rest

• Reachable electronically (most payers). The check goes out and the full benefits breakdown comes back in seconds. This is the normal path.
• Partial responders. Some payers confirm the patient is eligible but don't return every benefit detail electronically. The result shows what came back and marks the rest Not reported rather than guessing, see Reading the eligibility breakdown.
• Carrier not answering. Sometimes a carrier's system is down. The patient shows Re-check, nothing on the card is wrong, and you aren't charged. Try again in a few minutes.
• Can't be checked online. A small number of plans, often niche or self-funded ones, can't be checked electronically at all. The patient lands under Verifications with a problem at the top of the Verification tab with what the carrier said, so nothing silently falls through. Open Fix now to send a fix request to our team, or call the carrier's provider line when it's printed there.

Carriers you'll recognize

The list spans the major national carriers and many of their regional companies, for example Delta Dental, Cigna, Aetna, MetLife, Guardian, UnitedHealthcare, Ameritas, Principal, Humana, the Blue Cross Blue Shield family, state Medicaid dental plans and Medicare Advantage plans. This is a sample, not the full list. If a patient names a smaller regional or employer plan, search the list for it; it's often there.

Dental and medical are separate payers

A carrier's dental arm and medical arm usually have different payer IDs, even though they share a logo. "Aetna Dental" and "Aetna Medical," for instance, route to different places. If a check fails with the details looking correct, the wrong arm of the carrier is a common culprit. Pick the dental one and re-verify. More on this in A verification failed, what do I do?.

When a carrier won't match

If a check keeps failing and you think the carrier is wrong:

Frequently asked questions

Does Valian support medical insurance, or only dental? Both. The list includes dental and medical payers, including Medicare Advantage plans, and they all check through the same real-time path. For a dental practice, almost every check is a dental plan, so pick the dental plan named on the card.

A patient's small local plan isn't showing up, is it supported? Search the carrier list by one word from the name on the card. Companies that serve one state show that state next to their name. If you still can't find it, tell us (see the last question).

Why did a check come back as a partial response? That payer confirmed eligibility but didn't return the full benefit detail electronically. Re-verify in a few minutes, or call the provider number on the back of the card for the missing pieces.

My carrier isn't in the list at all, what now? Tell us. Submit a ticket from the Help Center or email help@valiansystems.com with the carrier name and payer ID from the patient's card, and we'll look into adding it.