Most employers are just now getting their 4th Quarter renewals for their health insurance and none of them are happy. The reason for these increases are mostly because we all have to conform to the Affordable Care Act and all of the crazy mandates and compliance issues. Some groups are seeing 30-80% increases coming up in December. There are some things that businesses can do to avoid much of this cost. There are no magic bullets, but if employers have a broker that specializes in Health Insurance and Employee Benefits, they should be on the cutting edge of the industry and have knowledge that most others don’t.
Benefits of having a Health Insurance broker and not a Generalist
When you have a broker that only does Health Insurance, they can help their employer groups with the outrageous Health Insurance renewal rates. One strategy is to move to a plan that has a slightly higher deductible and then utilize other Health Insurance products to help insure the deductible of the Health Insurance plan. The other products include Deductible Bridge plans, Accident Plans and other forward thinking insurance products. There is absolutely a learning curve for these type of deductible products, but once understood, many employers embrace them as a viable solution
Employer education is paramount in strategizing ObamaCare
Again..when you have an agent that services many lines of insurance, its like having a General Practitioner doctor. If you had a heart issue, you would probably want a Cardiologist, not a General Practitioner. Same analogy goes for the insurance industry. The Health Insurance world is even more dysfunctional than its ever been, and all the more reason to have someone that knows this niche field. ObamaCare is not going away. We already know that. They will continue to tweak it for years to come, but to hold out hope for the repeal…I would not hold my breath. All the more reason to make sure employers are educated in what is expected of them and the crazy mandates and compliance issues