The Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act, often called the Affordable Care Act represents some of the most far-reaching government overhaul of the U.S. healthcare system since 1965 when Medicare and Medicaid came into being. It will be phased in over time, but a number of changes have been delayed and won’t be in effect until 2015.
The act focuses on increasing the rate of health insurance coverage for American and reducing health care costs. Here’s what some area businesses have on their minds about health care reform as the time nears for the full impact of the ACA:
Darren Joseph
Vice President-Finance & Human Resources
Ebix Inc.
How is your company preparing for changes associated with health care reform?
We began reviewing the potential impact of the changes well ahead of the legislative process. We analyzed the effect on taxes and fees, calculated the potential of “pay or play” exposure and audited the minimum value of our plans. We prepared models for potential impact of a “Cadillac” plan tax. During the final step of this project we implemented new processes and procedures to accommodate notice and reporting requirements. We are prepared to provide additional educational information to our employee base as needed to address how these changes may affect individual employees and their covered family members on our plans.
Have you studied or instituted wellness programs to contain health care costs for your employees?
At Ebix we see wellness care as a core and vital part of our ongoing benefit plans, as well as a critical extended benefit to our employees. We began planning for the addition of a comprehensive wellness care initiative already in 2008 and 2009. In 2010 we had fully implanted it. The 2010 wellness care program is incentive-based, and includes full health risk assessments and biometric screenings. Employees are required to participate in the health risk assessments and biometric screenings, in order to fully participate.
We have tried to make the process as easy as possible for our employees. We have even provided the option of having their screening and testing done directly in the company’s offices in a confidential setting. They may instead choose to visit one of the many local labs in their area at their convenience. To help insure the highest percentage of participation, we have tried to also have some fun with this and have given gift cards to the employees as they completed their biometric screenings as well as providing healthy snacks and such as on the day of the onsite lab testing.
What other things are you doing specifically to contain health care costs for your employees?
The company continually reviews the performance of all of our group plans and monitors changes in how our employees utilize the plan benefits. We have implemented spousal surcharges for covered spouses who have access to other medical coverage but chose to remain on the company plan as their primary plan. This helps keep the employee contributions as low as possible. We look to use targeted regional providers with extra deep discounts where geographically possible. We also have a well-established disease management program in place in our plans.
Do you foresee having employees pay a larger share of company-offered health care coverage?
We believe having strong benefit plans with contribution costs at the market average or far lower, is important for retaining our top talent. The company works very hard to keep all out-of-pocket costs as low as possible for all our valued employees. We are always looking for ways to lower the employee’s costs, while still providing a high level of coverage with strong benefit plan designs. Like with most progressive companies, we are striving to be ahead of the curve as it pertains to group benefits, and we are combining creativity and innovation, with practical ideas that are easy to implement. We don’t just talk about or discuss in meetings and planning sessions. We are looking for ways to actually put these innovative ideas into production.
Dave Michelson
President and CEO
National Interstate
How is your company preparing for changes associated with health care reform?
National Interstate typically reviews all our benefit programs on an annual basis. The enactment of health care reform has not materially changed that process; it has simply added another layer of compliance-related items that we must be mindful of. Our primary goal of providing benefit programs to meet the needs of our employees and their families remains unchanged.
Have to studied or instituted wellness programs to contain health care costs for your employees?
Over the last several years, National Interstate has implemented a variety of wellness programs primarily in response to our employees including initiatives such as an onsite flu shot clinic, monthly newsletter, health fairs including screenings and wellness vendors, as well as lunch and learn speakers. There is no question employees have greater access to information and resources promoting healthy lifestyles than ever before. For an employer, it can often be difficult to quantify the results of individual employees reaching their health goal. It may simply mean that employee was able to attend a son or daughter’s soccer game. Those kinds of results are important in addition to focusing on healthcare cost containment.
What other things are you doing specifically to contain health care costs for your employees?
We believe educating employees about the plan they participate in is a key factor in containing health care costs. Most medical plans have discounts and incentives already built into the plan design, yet many times employees don’t fully utilize these features. We work in conjunction with our health care provider to disseminate information to employees so they can make informed health care decisions.
Do you foresee having employees pay a larger share of company-offered health care coverage?
It is impossible to predict what the future holds in terms of health care costs. What we do know is if our employees collectively work as a team, we have the best chance of minimizing health care costs for our organization. While we make health care choices as individuals, the impact of those choices from a rate perspective is felt amongst the group participating in the plan.
Anthony McBride
Principal, human resources
Edward Jones
How is your company preparing for changes associated with health care reform?
We have been making changes to eligibility and benefit levels as required by the regulations since the passage of the Affordable Care Act. We have made required modifications to our group medical plan to ensure that it meets the guidelines for 2014. We will continue to closely monitoring the regulations so that we are prepared to meet future requirements of the law.
Have you studied or instituted wellness programs to contain health care costs for your employees?
We have had a wellness program in place for several years, and anticipate it will help contain cost increases in the future by motivating our plan members to be aware of and gradually improve their health over time.
Due to health care reform what other things are you doing specifically to contain health care costs for your employees?
By 2009, we had moved to a consumer-driven health plan model. Our plan includes some pharmacy and medical treatment programs that help direct members to lower cost, higher quality sources of care. Soon we’ll introduce online cost/quality transparency tools to help raise awareness of the disparate cost spread that can exist even within an approved provider network.
Do you foresee having employees pay a larger share of company-offered health care coverage?
While we do not plan to shift a greater proportion of the cost to associates in 2014, the overall costs for health care continue to rise. In this regard, we have added a surcharge to cover spouses who have their own employer-based coverage available. We cannot speculate on what may happen in the future because the health care landscape is undergoing so much fluctuation.
