About StopWaiting

I'm Ben, Director of Stop Waiting.

Back in 2023, my mum was told she’d be waiting two years for a hip operation. That just wasn’t good enough. I wanted to help, and with my knowledge of the NHS, the healthcare system and coming from a corporate background, I knew there had to be a better way.

By digging into NHS policies and procedures, I managed to secure her treatment at a private hospital — not in two years, but in just three weeks. And importantly, it was fully paid for by the NHS. Private room, en-suite bathroom, excellent food, all aftercare like physio and equipment for her house - and not a penny paid.

When she’d had the procedure, she turned to me and said: “You have to let more people know about this.” That was the moment the idea for StopWaiting was born.

I even named the Ltd company after her. Viventia Ltd — inspired by her name, Viv, and the Latin word “Viventia,” meaning “to live freely, to be alive.”

With nearly 8 million people on NHS waiting lists, I realised what happened for my mum could help thousands of others. And we didn’t have to reinvent the wheel — just show people how to use the NHS more effectively, using its own policies and procedures.

Our History

May 2024

Researching the Market

The first question was whether there was even a market for what we were doing. Our research told us there should be. At the time, around 7.5 million people were stuck on waiting lists — and almost half had no idea they had the right to choose where they were treated.

July 2024

Launch & Customer Feedback

I don't think I anticipated how much demand there was for the service!

From the many enquiries we received early on, it quickly became clear where the biggest problems were: orthopaedics and ophthalmology. These are progressive, degenerative conditions that only get worse if left untreated, not to mention the increased risk of trips or falls — so they became our absolute priority. Today, procedures like hips, knees, and cataracts make up about 95% of the cases we help with.

As luck would have it, private hospitals are well geared-up for exactly these kinds of operations. So, not only do we find much shorter waiting times, but patients also benefit from high-end modern facilities, private rooms, en-suite bathrooms and even little things like free parking. And yes — the food is always mentioned in the feedback!

January 2025

NHS Changes

In January 2025, the NHS struck a formal agreement with private hospital groups to use their spare clinical capacity to treat NHS patients. Under the National Tariff, the NHS pays the same whether your hip is replaced in an NHS Trust or a private hospital — which means no extra cost to the NHS, but much quicker treatment for patients.

I often explain it like this: Imagine you’re at the supermarket and you spot a shorter queue. You move over, check out quicker, and the person behind you in your old line moves forward too. Everyone benefits. That’s what this scheme is like.

July 2025

First Commercial Partnership

We teamed up with a leading medical travel company, TMTC, to offer a wider range of options to our customers, where traditional routes couldn't always help - like IVF, or they weren't part of NHS England (residents of Scotland, Wales, NI).

What Makes Me Proud

There are so many moments, it’s hard to pick. The reviews and emails we receive are incredibly rewarding to read — people telling us about their surgery going ahead months or years sooner than anticipated, they're now pain free, or that they now have confidence in exercising their rights - that they're telling their GP what they want rather than just being told what they're going to get.

For me personally, the most meaningful thing is hearing about life after surgery. A grandparent who can now play on the floor with their grandkids or a dog-lover who can walk without stopping every 200 yards in pain. We've received hundreds of emails that have a story, a life changed - and knowing we helped make that possible is what we set out to do. For us, it's 'mission accomplished' and we genuinely take a moment to reflect on each of them.

One moment that stands out: I was at a family event when a lady approached me. She said, “I hear you run StopWaiting. I just wanted to say what a wonderful thing it is that you’ve done.” She gave me a hug and told me we’d changed her life. That’s something I’ll never forget.

And then there’s JK — a lady who came to us when told she’d be waiting a year for cataract surgery, while her eyesight worsened rapidly. From contacting us, to walking out of a seven-minute procedure in a private clinic, fully-funded by the NHS, took just four weeks. Since then, she’s referred literally everyone she knows. She even benefits from our refer-a-friend scheme, so she’s actually profited from using us!

Stories like those are what make me most proud.

Looking Ahead

We’re always improving how we handle enquiries — right now, between our website and social media profiles, we receive around a quarter of a million visits every month, and we're getting busier by the day.

We’ll continue to partner with organisations that can offer a broader range of treatments, for patients whose needs can’t be met quickly in the UK — services like IVF being a good example. And we’re exploring new areas where patients are struggling most, such as ADHD and ASD assessments.

My ultimate goal? To make StopWaiting free at the point of access — just like the NHS itself. We’re working on partnerships that could make that possible.

Why We’re Different

When we started, there wasn’t a service like ours and there still isn’t. That’s why we’ve quickly become the go-to place for patients who want faster NHS treatment.

We're ethical: We want our service to be accessible to all - and so we deliberately set our pricing to be affordable. We partnered with Klarna too, so that patients can decide how and when they pay, if that option helps them. We also try and do a few cases each week pro-bono (without cost) for those most in need. If we can help; we think we should, and cost shouldn't always be a barrier.

We keep it simple. If we say we’ll deliver, we do. And if we can’t, we refund. That’s been our policy since day one — and we’ve only ever had to use it a handful of times, and that's usually when someone comes to us from outside England where NHS policies differ. We don't even advertise in these regions, but word of mouth goes a long way.

Our goal is simple: 'Help the person by empowering the patient' - We help NHS patients use their rights and entitlements to make sure they get the quickest possible care. Too many patients are referred into NHS Trusts with long waiting times and assume, “that’s just how it is.”

But it isn’t.

Want to Stop Waiting?

Since we launched, we've helped countless patients - just like you.

If you need guidance or support, or just want to see if we can help you get a faster referral, contact us and we’ll do everything we can to help.