ZoomDoc is a private on-demand GP app which provides patients access to GPs 24/7 through paid-for face-to-face home visits, telephone and online Skype-style consultation. The company employs NHS GPs.
ZoomDoc's corporate services includes: work based clinics, health assessments, on demand visits and telephone or video calls. Telephone advice is priced from £35 per ten minutes, video advice from £35 per ten minutes and a home visit will cost from £125 for 25 minutes.
Last updated: March 2025
Strategy
ZoomDoc's strategy is to target individuals and businesses. Businesses are encouraged to use ZoomDoc for their employees to enable employees to be treated quickly without waiting for appointments. ZoomDoc claims that this is proven to reduce sick leave and absence levels. A major focus of the company's business is now providing a range of letters, including certifying a person is sick, well enough to carry out an activity (flying, going on a cruise, for visa applications etc.), or that the medication they have is one they have been prescribed. Sick notes as they are known in the UK are letters provided by GPs for patients to give to their employers for leave of absence due to ill health. Letters certifying sickness are also issued for holiday cancellations.
The company was incorporated and registered with the Care Quality Commission on 14 April 2015, with the following founding team:
- Dr Kenny Livingstone- Founder and Ceo, Clinical Lead- registered manager/director
- Eugene Kouumdjieff- Co-founder and Head of Product
- Hal Livingstone. Founder and Legal Advisor
- Matt Hagger Co-Founder and Advisor Growth Strategy USA
- Paul Landau Non Executive Director and Strategy Consultant
In early 2025, the company had two directors - Dr Kenny Livingstone and K McDonnell, the latter appointed in 2023.
ZoomDoc employs GPs that also work for the NHS. GPs can sign up to the app for free, register themselves as ‘on call’ and specify how long they want to be available for and how far they would travel for home calls. The app launched in March 2017 and mid-2021 had around 500 GPs on its books.
The Covid-19 pandemic gave a new business area for ZoomDoc - Covid-19 testing, including fit-to-fly testing and those for UK arrivals. The company promises results in 12-24 hours.
Financials
The company had net assets of £504k as of April 2024, according to accounts on Companies House its turnover is unreported and its cash in the bank is reported at £240K. The company reports that it had only 7 employees in the year to April 2024.
According to the company's profile on Crunchbase, it has received £689.1k from crowdfunding and individual investors (an Angel round of investment).
Investors
ZoomDoc has had a total funding figure of £689.1k through two funding rounds, according to Crunchbase. This came from an initial £150k investment from CEO and Founder, Dr Kenny Livingstone and £539.1k from Seedrs in the form of Equity Crowdfunding.
British tennis star Andy Murray made an undisclosed investment into the company through the Seedrs crowdfunding page, along with around 275 other investors
Contracts
ZoomDoc has yet to procure any major NHS contracts, but the company's aim is to bid for out-of-hours contracts from CCGs across the country.
Concerns
In August 2024 ZoomDoc was part of an investigation by journalists at the Daily Mail into the issuing of sick notes. The journalists found that several on-line private GP companies, including ZoomDoc, UpDoc, and The GP Clinic, provided sick notes for time off work with very little information on the journalists health. In one case the journalist stated 'I would really benefit from time off work due to the hot weather and I want to be spending time at the beach. The sick notes cost around £25 to £55. The Daily Mail article reports that:
"Dr Kenny Livingstone, an urgent care GP at the Royal Free NHS Hospital in London, signed a sick note just seven minutes after our reporter recorded a 30-second video pledging stress and anxiety. He is the majority shareholder in ZoomDoc, the company that provided the service."
A CQC investigation into the service, published in April 2018, found that the service ‘provided responsive, caring and well-led services in accordance with the relevant regulations. However, the service was not providing safe and effective services in some areas in accordance with the relevant regulations.’
There is a general concern with these new digital services and their use of NHS GPs; although the doctors will be paid extra, their time and energy is being taken directly from the NHS with nothing given back. In addition, GPs already work inhumanely long hours and inviting them to work through their lunch-breaks or after hours will make this worse, meaning that all patients will receive sub-par treatment if doctors work longer days. This is just a quick digital fix for the rich that overlooks the bigger picture.
