If you have SeeChange Health Insurance, you are going to have to change that insurance come January 2015. SeeChange is going out of business. Not exactly sure of the reason, but Independent Brokers like us have not sold their Health Plans because their pricing is not in line with the industry. A few years ago, SeeChange was the go to Health Insurance company. They had a high deductible plan that blew the doors off of the rest of the carriers. In our little agency, I had almost 60 groups with SeeChange alone. This was all before the Affordable Care Act. Slowly but surely, the SeeChange plans changed, the deductibles got higher and so did the pricing. Companies that have SeeChange have had to move away from them fairly steadily over the last year or so. There are many alternatives for companies that have SeeChange right now.
Companies that have SeeChange Health Insurance have many options
Even with SeeChange leaving the Health Insurance industry, there are many other carriers that have plans that are competitive and comprehensive. The most favorite right now is California Choice or CalChoice. With CalChoice, they offer Kaiser, HealthNet, Anthem Blue Cross, Aetna and United HealthCare under one offering. The nice thing about CalChoice is that there is no participation minimums, meaning each employee can be on a different plan with a different carrier. A nice option when you have employees that either love or hate Kaiser. Now you can address both. In previous years, CalChoice was much more expensive for the “choice” offered. With Health Reform, that has all changed. Their pricing is actually the same, or even less than many other carriers. Its leveled the playing field.
CalChoice offers plans with having a much more robust choice in Health Insurance
I don’t mean this to be a CalChoice commercial, but I will admit they have the corner on the market now, with all of the choice and pricing. The are a bit hard nosed about working with you to resolve problems however. CalChoice has a reputation of being a bit stubborn with clients that may have made a mistake in enrollment or need some consideration. They’re not unfair, just a bit hard to deal with sometimes. We’ve placed several groups with CalChoice over the years, they have a good product and they treat brokers fairly. Other carriers need to work quickly for the first part of 2015 if they want to capture some of the market away from CalChoice.