What am I actually buying?
NWAPS signed a business associate agreement (BAA) with Zoom, which makes HIPAA-compliant any Zoom license joined to the Alliance’s Zoom group. Zoom sells these licenses to the Alliance in bulk at a discount. We resell those licenses to our members. When you join the Alliance's Zoom group from your current Zoom account or by creating a new Zoom account, we assign one of the bulk licenses to you. Zoom reimburses to you any credit remaining from your previous license.
Do I need to gather a group of 10 to register?
No. Registration through this program is individual and is tied to your Alliance membership.
Do I need to be an Alliance member to register?
Yes. Registration through this program is a benefit of Alliance membership and is only available to current Alliance members. If you would like to register or renew your membership, you can do so here.
Will the Alliance run out of licenses if I don't register in time?
No. We can buy more licenses at any time. The registration process may be delayed while Zoom processes our bulk license purchase. This usually takes 1 business day.
How does this process work, exactly?
The steps in the ordering process are as follows:
- You register on the Alliance website by paying $144 and providing us with the email address currently associated with your Zoom account (or the one you would like associated with your Zoom account if you currently don’t have one).
- We receive your registration and payment.
- A member of the Technology Committee asks Zoom to send an email to the address you provided. The email invites you to join the Alliance’s Zoom group.
- You receive an email from Zoom with a link inside to join the group.
- The email will look like this:
- You click on the link in the email from Zoom and follow the prompts on Zoom’s website.
- If you already have a paid Zoom account, you will be asked whom should receive a refund for any remaining balance on your current Zoom account. Select the “Refund to Me” option.
- If you do not already have a Zoom account, you will be asked to create one and fill out basic registration information.
- Your account is all set up and ready to use!
How long do I have to wait between registering and accessing my new account?
Because the process of entering new email addresses into Zoom is manual, and because the members of the Technology Committee are volunteers, it can take up to 24 hours for them to enter new Zoom registrants into the system. Also, sometimes we need to buy more licenses from Zoom before we can assign one to you and this process can take up to one business day. Because of these two factors, getting up and running with your shiny new HIPAA-compliant Zoom account could take as little as 30 minutes, or as much as two business days. We thank you for your patience.
Will I need new Zoom login information?
If you already have a Zoom account, you will not need any new login information, and your previous email and password will work. Your old Zoom account will not be replaced by the Alliance Zoom account; rather, your old Zoom account will be upgraded and associated with the Alliance’s Zoom group.
If you do not already have a Zoom account you will be prompted to create one when your registration is processed.
How much information will the Alliance be able to access about my Zoom account?
Zoom automatically creates a “dashboard” for Alliance Zoom group administrators which displays metadata about group members’ meetings, including what they choose to title meetings, how many participants are involved in each meeting, duration of each meeting, and which connection types are allowed in each meeting (VOIP, video, screen sharing, etc.). While this dashboard is officially accessible to Alliance Presidents, Board Members, the Technology Committee, Administrator and Web Developer, our Technology Committee, per internal policy, are the only group administrators who will use the dashboard for the purpose of evaluating its usefulness and providing technical support to membership.
IMPORTANT: TO MAINTAIN HIPAA COMPLIANCE, PLEASE DO NOT USE FULL NAMES OF CLIENTS WHEN NAMING ZOOM MEETINGS. Because the names of recurring Zoom meetings are visible to the group administrator, use alternate methods of identifying sessions. Initials, generic names, or time-specific names are acceptable.
For example, if you are Jane Doe, and your client is John Smith, and you meet at 9 am on Wednesdays, the following meeting title examples are HIPAA-compliant: “JD & JS,” “Jane Doe’s Zoom Meeting,” “Meeting with John,” and “Wednesday 9 am Psychotherapy.” Meeting names that are not HIPAA -compliant are: “John Smith,” “Therapy with John Smith,” or “John Smith Jane Doe Psychotherapy for Depression and PTSD Wednesdays at 9 am.”
The Alliance will not have access to the names, email addresses, or IP addresses of anyone who joins a meeting hosted by one of our members. Administrators do not have access to any cloud recordings of meetings that group members create. Such information and data are only available to the account that creates the meeting and/or recording.
What settings will change after I transfer my Zoom account?
When you join the Alliance Zoom group, other members of the Alliance Zoom group will automatically be added to your personal Zoom contacts under "Company Contacts." Any personal contacts you have already imported into your Zoom account should still be there, and they are not accessible to other group members or administrators.
Some account settings can only be changed or enabled by a Zoom group administrator (zoom@nwaps.org). You might encounter settings that are not enabled but which you would like to use. If this happens, please email zoom@nwaps.org with the specific setting you would like enabled and we will enable it for you.
Can I pay monthly instead of annually?
We are unable to accomidate monthly billing at this time. Our contract with Zoom is written in a way that makes it financially unfeasible for us to bill monthly, as each license that we purchase is an annual license whose full fee is due at time of purchase. Because we are a nonprofit, we do not have the financial overhead to cover the annual cost of dozens of licenses while we wait for those monies to come back to us in monthly installments.
Aren’t there other, free, HIPAA-compliant telehealth platforms out there?
Yes. Doxy.me is one example. Zoom has become a common platform for telehealth and provides some functionality and stability that other, free services do not offer. The Alliance approached Zoom to provide this stable, HIPAA-compliant service to our members at a lower price.
How can I get a copy of the BAA for my records?
Download it here.