If you own a company that does not have the required participation to enroll into a Group Health Plan or a Group Benefits Plan for your company, there IS an alternative. Once a year, all the carriers are mandated to allow any company to enroll into a Group Benefits Plan. Group Benefits are available to all companies through the ACA. There is no penalty for low participation during this time but you have to enroll between November 15th and December 15th with an effective date of January 1. We get so many calls from employers that want to offer Group Benefits to their employees but they just can’t meet the typical 70% participation that is required.
Available Group Benefits during this Special Enrollment Period for businesses
All of the typical health insurance products are available for companies that take advantage of this SEP (Special Enrollment Period) for businesses. The only downside is that, depending on the carrier, they may want to “recertify” your company after 12 months of coverage. That means that (Anthem in particular) will ask to see your payroll reports and want you to meet the standard participation rules for that time frame, no matter what you originally enrolled into. If you have a broker that specializes in Group Benefits or Health Insurance for companies, they know which carriers are the ones to avoid when it comes to the SEP enrollment
Having a Group Benefits Broker that is an expert, is definitely an advantage
First of all, the price of the coverage is the same, whether you use someone that doesn’t know what they’re doing, or a specialist that ONLY does Group Benefits. Its like having a heart issue and seeing a Cardiologist vs. a General Practitioner. Both are good docs, but one has a specialty. When we started our agency in 2003, we had no idea that this crazy dysfunctional industry would be such a niche product in 2017. There are so many mandates now with Group Benefit Plans, that employers “don’t know what they don’t know”.
Brauer Insurance are the experts at Group Benefits. I”ve taught Group Benefits at UC Santa Cruz Extension, been featured on KPIX on some of their ObamaCare segments and doing Group Benefits since 2003.