| BenefitsLink Welfare Plans Newsletter |   |
December 7, 2005
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Findings from the Kaiser/Hewitt 2005 Survey on Retiree Health Benefits
Excerpt: "The 2005 Kaiser/Hewitt survey of large businesses that provide retiree health benefits to their workers assesses their responses to the new Medicare drug benefit in 2006, their plans for the future, and the way these changes affect retirees. It also looks at the rising costs and changing benefits of retiree health coverage overall in 2005." (Kaiser Family Foundation)
HSA State Implementation Report -- Updated
Excerpt: "Many states have insurance laws that conflict with the requirements for Health Savings Accounts (HSAs) and hinder insurers' ability to offer HSA-compatible policies. CAHI's 'HSA State Implementation Report' has those answers. It reviews the state HSA environment and recent legislative action in one concise document." (Council for Affordable Health Insurance)
Long-Term Care Insurance Premium Deductions in the Business Setting
Excerpt: "There are three questions your clients want answered: Does the business get a deduction if it pays the premium? Is the employee taxed on the premium the business pays? Will benefits paid by the policy be taxed?" (Advisor Today)
Principal Adds Grief Counseling to Group Life Beneficiaries
Excerpt: "The Principal Financial Group is now making available grief support services for group life insurance beneficiaries. According to a Principal news release, the services are now available to all group basic term life, voluntary term life and group universal life insurance beneficiaries." (PLANSPONSOR.com; one-time registration required)
Judge Overturns Benefits Denial in Accidental Death Case
Excerpt: "A federal judge in West Virginia has thrown out a benefits denial by an accidental death and dismemberment benefit plan administrator who turned down death benefits to the widow after ruling the participant's death was not an accident." (PLANSPONSOR.com; one-time registration required)
Testimony: Veterans Disability Benefits: Claims Processing Challenges/Opportunities for Improvement
18 pages. Excerpt: "The Chairman, Committee on Veterans' Affairs, U.S. House of Representatives, asked GAO to report on the claims processing challenges and opportunities facing the Department of Veterans Affairs (VA) disability compensation and pension program. [C]oncerns include long waits for decisions, large claims backlogs, and inaccurate decisions. [Highlights of the testimony are at http://www.gao.gov/highlights/d06283thigh.pdf.]" (U.S. Government Accountability Office)
Patients, or Their Companies, Pay for In-Depth Look at Health and More
Excerpt: "Richard Buckley, 47, of the Dallas suburb Flower Mound, was also impressed with the time he got to spend with a doctor at Baylor. 'She's asking you, 'Anything else?' and you start to realize, this is great. A doctor is talking to me,' said Buckley, who like many who undergo such assessments was sent as a perk from his company." (Star Telegram.com; one-time registration required)
Two Senators Address Advantages and Approaches to Health Care Information Technology
Excerpt: "The Hill [published today] two opinion pieces by senators discussing the use of health information technology. [Summaries of the pieces are on the target page.]" (Kaiser Family Foundation)
Self-Funded Health Insurance: It's About Risk, Vulnerability, Cost Savings
Excerpt: "More and more companies are exploring self-funding for their health plans and rolling the dice that they can economically administer the plan and save the money that would go toward an insurance company's profit margin." (The Business Review (Albany) via bizjournals.com; one-time registration required)
Formulary Additions: The Big Picture
Excerpt: "Actuaries are responsible for the bottom line of a health plan, so when they evaluate the formulary and its new products, they look at the impact on the plan's total budget. Typically, they are asked to figure out what will happen, on a dollar-and-cents level, to the plan's entire system of treatments once doctors begin to write pres.criptions for a new drug." (Pharma.ceutical Executive)
Staying@Work™ 2005/2006 -- 8th Edition of Study
Excerpt: "This year's Staying@Work study demonstrates that companies with a health and productivity strategy boost their bottom line. In particular, organizations that invest in multiple best practices and integrate health and productivity programs are achieving desired results such as reducing costs and lost time (both the rate and the duration of absences) as well as improving employee health." (Watson Wyatt Worldwide)
Links to Items on Executive Comp, Benefits in General
Overview: FASB Reconsidering Accounting Standards for Pension & Other Postretirement Benefit Plans (PDF)
Excerpt: "[P]ension plan funding is the subject of increased scrutiny from Congress, investors, the media and the public. In addition, pension expense and unfunded liability reporting is now the focus of attention from FASB, which recently announced its intention to reconsider its accounting standards for pension and postretirement benefit plans. .... This Spotlight presents an overview of the implications and how employers may want to respond." (The Segal Company)
Milliman's Monthly Benefit News and Developments, December 2005 (PDF)
2 pages. The newsletter provides a summary of the previous month's legislative, regulatory, and judicial information on employee Benefits. (Milliman)
Overview: When Equity Compensation is Considered Deferred Compensation and How to Avoid it
Excerpt: "This installment of the Mintz Levin Deferred Compensation Advisory Series focuses on what equity compensation arrangements are exempt from the deferred compensation rules of § 409A of the Internal Revenue Code of 1986 .... As more fully described in our prior client advisories on deferred compensation, Code §409A was enacted under the American Jobs Creation Act of 2004, and it changed several tax rules governing deferred compensation." (Mintz, Levin, Cohn, Ferris, Glovsky and Popeo, P.C.)
Collected Links Pertaining to Code Section 409A and Related Guidance
To date, the collection includes: Text of 409A; IRS Notice 2005-1; Proposed Regulations; Deloitte: The Effect of Section 409A: Now and in the Future; Alden Bianchi: The Effects of Internal Revenue Code §409A on the Design and Operation of Ineligible Plans of Deferred Compensation of Tax-Exempt Employers; and, from Kilpatrick Stockton: The Wait Is Over: Proposed Regulations Under Section 409A. (Attorney B. Janell Grenier via BenefitsBlog.com)
Court Finds Employer May Have Misrepresented Benefits Following Sale
Excerpt: "The US District Court for the Western District of North Carolina denied summary judgment in favor of an employer accused of a breach of fiduciary duties under the Employee Retirement Income Security Act (ERISA) for withholding details of the company's sale." (PLANSPONSOR.com; one-time registration required)
Washington Regulatory Wrap Up, As of November 30, 2005 (PDF)
3 pages. The chart of federal regulatory proposals concerning employee benefits of interest to NCTR members has been updated to be current as of November 30, 2005. The federal updates referenced in the chart are available at http://www.nctr.org/federal/index.html. (National Council on Teacher Retirement)
Working Paper Abstract: Salary or Benefits?
Excerpt: "Employer-provided benefits are a large and growing share of compensation costs. In this paper, I consider three factors that can affect the value created by employer-sponsored benefits. First, firms have a comparative advantage (for example, due to scale economies or tax treatment) in purchasing relative to employees." (National Bureau of Economic Research; paid subscription or individual purchase required to retrieve full-text)
Newly Posted Events
New Retiree Health Benefits Study Captures Large Firms' Responses to Medicare Drug Law
Nationwide on December 7, 2005
presented by Kaiser Family Foundation
Newly Posted Press Releases
Workplace Options Reaffirms Commitment to Union Partners With Expansion to Downtown Detroit
(Workplace Options)
Ed Reaven Joins Eisner Retirement Solutions LLC as National Sales Manager
(Eisner Retirement Solutions LLC)
Newly Posted or Renewed Job Openings
ERISA/Benefits Attorney
for Parker, Poe, Adams & Bernstein L.L.P.
in NC
EB Account Manager (Service)
for The Protector Group Insurance Agency, Inc.
in MA
Assistant Director - Member Programs
for 1199SEIU National Benefit and Pension Funds
in NY
Consulting Associate
for McCready and Keene, Inc.
in VA
ERISA Consultant
for BISYS Retirement Services
in MN
ERISA Attorney
for BISYS Retirement Services
in MN
401(k)/Retirement Plan Administrator for Pension Consulting/Services Firm
for J.M. Singley & Associates, Inc.
in PA
Health and Welfare Account Management
for Charles W. Cammack Associates, Inc.
in NY
Client Services Analyst - H & G
for Mercer HR Services
in IL
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Copyright 2005 BenefitsLink.com, Inc.; except that you may reprint this newsletter in full (including this sentence) without obtaining our permission.
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