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Health Care Reforms - How Are You Dealing With Them?

Guest post by: Betsey Nash

Article Overview: Health Care Reforms are beginning to roll out now. Do you know how to deal with them? How are your employees responding? Betsey has some advise for you.

Health Care Reforms - How Are You Dealing With Them?

Health Insurance after the Affordable Care Act...

Two things going on here: The planning needed to prepare for future regulations and the costs associated with them; and communicating that with your employees. We have already seen most insurance carriers include adult children of their employees in their coverage. If an adult child had already been cut, then they can be reinstated as soon as you have your next open enrollment. But not the kids' kids. And this is a huge point: If one of your employees' kids is on their parents' insurance and has a baby, the pregnancy is covered all through the delivery . . . but the baby is not. Insurance companies do not want to offer any more coverage than is mandated and this birth-to-baby point was either lost in the tedium of the excruciatingly long process or lobbied out of the bill. Regardless, check with your broker and advise your employees before their kids make their, uh, plans.

The grandfathering issue is a critical part of your strategic planning. By now you should know if you want to stick with your existing coverage and by-pass some of the new regulations or adopt some policy changes for whatever reason and abide by the new regs. Sticking with your old policy may allow you to offer different levels of coverage: Better plans for the execs than for the hourly workers, for example. There are elements of the new regulations with which you must comply, regardless of whether you grandfather your plan or not - you cannot limit lifetime benefits or rescind coverage, keep out adult children of your employees, nor exclude pre-existing conditions.

And by now, you know whether you qualify for the small business tax credit that was included in the bill. I imagine the number of workers you employee has taken on extra importance relative to the new regs.

Communicating with your employees is also critical, even as we are being told that some regulations may be modified over time. No telling what they are hearing now, but they all heard the long, drawn out process that preceded passage, and they need to be reassured that you are looking out for their best interests as you consider all the options presented to you for their coverage. You can tell them that your coverage will either be affordable or they will have the option to shop at the insurance exchanges which are now being formed. No, we don't know what the exchange policies will cost, but, by law, they cannot cost more than 9.6% of the employee's family income. You can tell them that insurance companies are falling over themselves to create affordable plans that meet the minimum coverage requirements outlined in the Act.

Betsey's HR Law #4: Employees who feel confident that they are kept informed are less a pain in the neck than those who are afraid they are left out of the loop.

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Article Tags: affordable care act, employees, health care reforms, insurance



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