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CCH® BENEFITS — 11/20/06
HSA Marketplace
from Spencer’s Benefits Reports: The number of employers that offer health savings accounts (HSAs) has more than doubled since 2005, according to the 2006 Spencer Survey of Consumer-Driven Health Plans. In 2006, 28% of employers offered an HSA, up from the 12% that offered the consumer-driven health plan (CDHP) in 2005. Here is a spotlight of the latest HSA news.
- HSA Bank has launched an online HSA communication program for agents and employers. The kit, which provides communications directed to both the employer and its employees to foster a stronger understanding of HSAs, consists of pre-enrollment, enrollment, and post-enrollment sections. The pre-enrollment communications focus on explaining the concept and advantages of HSAs. The enrollment communications section provides instructions for employees to enroll in the HSA. The post-enrollment communications are monthly sessions that provide current information on HSAs and tips to become a better health care consumer.
- CIGNA HealthCare has unveiled HealthePass, a new solution designed to simplify and improve payment processes to help patients anticipate and manage their health care costs, shorten the provider revenue cycle, and help address patient bad debt. HealthePass will feature American Express’ “hold-and-settle” process that reserves the patient’s payment from the patient’s funding source, such as an HSA and releases the patient payment at the same time the insurance claim is settled. HealthePass will be made available by CIGNA at no additional cost for providers that accept credit cards. Using HealthePass, both patient and provider will know the patient’s estimated costs up-front and be able to ensure payment funding so that the provider does not have to separately bill the patient.
- American Community Mutual Insurance Company has introduced an HSA plan to employers and individuals in Illinois, Iowa, Missouri, and Nebraska. The Next Generation HSA is a qualified high-deductible health plan (HDHP), which offers multiple payment-sharing options to help individuals select coverage to best fit their needs. Another feature of the plan is that the deductible is waived for the first 30 days of care after an accident.
- Employers are now able to offer the Patriot Healthcare/Comp-Sigma Wellness Program, which combines an HDHP from Manchester-based Patriot with an in-house wellness program administered by Comp-Sigma of Concord. To be eligible for the program, a company must agree to put at least $200 per year into an HSA for each of its employees who participate in the wellness program.
- Priority Health is bringing cost transparency to Michigan, providing common cost estimates for medical procedures, health services, and prescription drugs online. Priority Health recently presented two new online tools. Priority Health’s Common Costs Tool provides cost estimates for more than 85 common procedures and health services, such as hospital/ER fees, imaging and radiology, labs and testing, medical supplies and equipment, physician office services, and therapy services. The Pharmacy Tool provides estimated costs for approved prescription drugs.
- WorldatWork and the National Business Group on Health have teamed to create an e-learning program entitled “HSA Fundamentals—Key Components and Operational Requirements of Health Savings Accounts.” The course was developed for benefits professionals, HR generalists, and management seeking a better understanding of the trend toward consumer-driven health care.
- Great-West Healthcare, a national employee benefits provider, recently added a new resource to its suite of decision-support tools available on its Web site. The new Plan Cost Comparison tool helps users evaluate costs for up to three plan options. It estimates annual health care expenses for an individual or family based on information entered by the user. Estimated results are calculated by the parameters of the plan entered by the user so that individuals have an estimate of expected out-of-pocket costs for each option. The tool also factors in potential tax savings from user-entered information about pretax payment of premiums and contributions to an HSA or flexible spending account (FSA).
- CashEdge, Inc., and Canopy Financial have partnered to provide financial institutions with the infrastructure needed to address the complexities associated with originating and managing health care-related financial accounts. Canopy Financial processes a CDHC financial transaction every 14 seconds, and CashEdge’s platform is currently used in more than 500 institutions, including five of the top ten banks and seven of the top 50 credit unions.
- BenefitStreet has selected comparison-shopping tools from Vimo to enhance BenefitStreet’s Consumer Driven Healthcare Solutions. BenefitStreet will integrate Vimo’s physician, hospital, and surgical procedure shopping tools into its CDHC solutions, including the HSA. With the addition of the Vimo technology, BenefitStreet customers will now be able to compare prices on surgical procedures, investigate hospital facilities, and run background checks on virtually any physician or dentist in the country.
For more information on this and related topics, consult the CCH Pension Plan Guide, CCH Employee Benefits Management, and Spencer's Benefits Reports.
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