BenefitsLink Health & Welfare Plans Newsletter for April 16, 2007

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Health & Welfare Plans
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April 16, 2007

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Text of Policy Group's Comments to DOL on the FMLA (PDF)
25 pages; presented by the National Coalition to Protect Family Leave, whose members include the National Association of Manufacturers, the Retail Industry Leaders Association and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. The paper criticizes a survey prepared in 2000 by a private research corporation for the U.S. Department of Labor. The purpose of that survey was to assess the scope and economic impact of the FMLA. (Jeffrey A. Eisenach of Criterion Economics, for the National Coalition to Protect Family Leave)

Economists Describe Benefits and Costs of the FMLA from a Consumer Welfare Perspective (PDF)
39 pages; presented by the National Coalition to Protect Family Leave, whose members include the National Association of Manufacturers, the Retail Industry Leaders Association and the U.S. Chamber of Commerce. Excerpt: "Many of the costs cited by firms and discussed above are a dead weight loss to society. They create no public value beyond offsetting unnecessary costs attributable to lack of sufficient care and diligence in government rule making and implementation." (Larry F. Darby, Ph. D. and Joseph P. Fuhr, Ph. D.)

TPA and Excess Loss Insurer Did Not Exercise Discretion and Were Not Plan Fiduciaries
Excerpt: "After a participant's self-insured health plan denied benefits arising from injuries sustained during a home invasion, the participant sued his employer, the plan's TPA, and the plan's excess loss insurer under ERISA for benefits and for breach of fiduciary duty. The TPA and insurer argued that they should not be included in the lawsuit and asked the court for a summary judgment (that is, judgment without a trial)." (Employee Benefits Institute of America Inc.)

RadioShack Drops Some Employee Benefits
Excerpt: "RadioShack Corp. on Thursday ended employee benefit plans that allow for tuition reimbursement, adoption reimbursement, matching gifts for charitable contributions and third-party discounts on such items as child care and vehicle purchases. The cuts are effective immediately, according to a company memo obtained by the Star-Telegram." (Fort Worth Star-Telegram via Human Resource Executive Online; free registration required)

Initiatives Encourage Bike and Bus Transportation by Commuters
Excerpt: "The Tennessee Department of Transportation has approved an $87,000 Commuter Transportation Assistance Program grant to fund a bike distribution initiative and a free bus pass program." (Chattanooga Times Free Press)

City of Duluth's Mayor Signs Retiree Health Care Irrevocable Trust Resolution
Excerpt: "It is estimated that fully funding the irrevocable trust will lead to a one-third reduction in the anticipated retiree health care obligation in perpetuity." (BusinessNorth.com)

TAMRA Criteria Continue to Guide COBRA Compliance
Excerpt: "The key to COBRA compliance has existed for almost two decades. Locating this key can be a challenge, almost akin to following a map to buried treasure. To find this COBRA secret, you must look in Senate Report 100-445. The key is in a single paragraph on page 483." (Infinisource)

PEO Has No Standing to Sue for Recovery of Losses
Excerpt: "'Professional employer organizations' offering health benefits face serious challenges in finding sound and efficient claims administrators and insurance carriers for their assorted groups. This case presents an example of what can go wrong with such plans and the inability of the PEO to shift any of the consequences to the service providers it relied upon." (Health Plan Law blog by Attorney Roy F. Harmon III)

Plans Put Greater Emphasis on Cancer Management
Excerpt: "Increasingly, health plans are providing disease, case, and utilization management when a beneficiary receives a cancer diagnosis." (Managed Care Magazine)

Managing Cancer Treatment Begins Before Diagnosis
Excerpt: "Health plans are increasingly involved in promoting the lifestyle changes that help their members avoid cancer, and are increasingly involved in clinical trials if prevention fails." (Managed Care Magazine)

Washington State Legislation Promoting EHR Adoption Moves Forward
Excerpt: "The Washington state House on Thursday passed a broad health care measure that would allow online access to a health science library and encourage the adoption of electronic health records, the AP/Seattle Times reports." (California HealthCare Foundation; free registration may be required)

AOL Founder Hopes to Build New Giant Among a Bevy of Health Care Web Sites
Excerpt: "The site, to be officially introduced on Thursday, is part of Mr. Case's Revolution Health Group, a company he has bankrolled with a group of others who -- like him -- are famous for what they used to do for a living, including Carleton S. Fiorina and Colin L. Powell." (The New York Times; free registration required)

Comments on Study of the Influence of Out-of-Pocket Costs on Physicians' Decisions
Excerpt: "[Physician Consideration of Patients' Out-of-Pocket Costs in Making Common Clinical Decisions] is yet one more study which demonstrates that attempting to control costs by requiring patients to pay more out-of-pocket when accessing health care has only limited impact on the more complex services which account for most of our health care spending." (Archives of Internal Medicine via Physicians for a National Health Program)

Insurers Can Give Patients the Tools to Make Good Decisions
Excerpt: "Medical care involves choice, and often consumers go with the less expensive option when given all the facts." (Managed Care Magazine)

The Road to True Consumer-Driven Health Care
Excerpt: "The theory of this new model in health care -- in which consumers make rational decisions based on cost, quality and an incentive to save money -- is hitting up against the realities of a marketplace that has just started changing to meet the demands of health care users." (Workforce Management; free registration required)

Massachusetts Implements Health Plan Nondiscrimination Rules
Excerpt: "Massachusetts agencies are moving ahead with efforts to implement the state's health coverage access expansion program. The Massachusetts Division of Insurance has issued a bulletin that explains the state's new health coverage nondiscrimination law, which takes effect July 1." (The National Underwriter Company; free registration or paid subscription required)

Health Care Measures Pass Washington State House and Senate
Excerpt: "The Washington state House and Senate have each approved health care legislation aimed at establishing universal health care. The Associated Press reports that the bill passed in the state house is based on recommendations issued by Governor Chris Gregoire's Blue Ribbon Commission on Health Care Costs and Access . . . ." (PLANSPONSOR.com; free registration required)

Opinion: New Proposals Would Share Responsibility for Health Insurance Coverage
Excerpt: "Most of the state and federal plans are built upon the same foundation: the concept of 'shared responsibility.' This idea -- proposed in Commonwealth Fund-staff authored publications . . . -- posits that individuals, employers, and the state and federal government all bear responsibility for health insurance." (Karen Davis via The Commonwealth Fund)

Opinion: Health Care and the Right's Tactics
Excerpt: "Beware conservatives sounding reasonable. The mostly positive review of Jonathan Cohn's book in the New York Times by Sally Satel of the American Enterprise Institute includes this passage, which subtly hints at how the right is planning to thwart the building momentum toward universal coverage . . . ." (TPM Cafe via The Century Foundation)

Many U.S. Workers Consider Health Insurance Most Important Part of Benefits Packages, Survey Finds
Excerpt: "Most U.S. workers employed at large businesses consider health coverage to be the most important part of their benefits packages, according to a survey released . . . by the National Business Group on Health." (Kaiser Family Foundation)

New Ideas for Perennial Issues -- From Day Care to Job Shares
Excerpt: "Typically, new ideas for managing work and family are scarce. That means a lot of people spend a lot of time feeling stuck as they try to achieve a better quality of life using the same old methods: flextime, getting organized and multitasking more efficiently." (The Wall Street Journal Online via CareerJournal.com)

Links to Items on Executive Comp, Benefits in General

ERISA Plan Must Consider Mailbox Rule in Resolving Dispute about Receipt of Required Paperwork
Excerpt: "EBIA Comment: Disputes about receipt of paperwork arise in many situations, and the reasoning of this decision could apply with equal force to health and welfare plan enrollment forms or forms under a plan's claims procedures, among others. Outside the COBRA context (where the DOL has expressly adopted the 'received-upon-mailing' rule for COBRA elections and premium payments), ERISA does not impose particular procedures for determining the timeliness of required paperwork." (Employee Benefits Institute of America Inc.)

Hospitals Craft Packages for Wealthy Executives
Excerpt: "Known as executive physicals, these services combine cutting-edge medical diagnostics with hours of personal attention from teams of specialists. The examinations usually involve blood work, treadmill stress tests, hearing and vision exams, and body composition analysis." (Rocky Mountain News)

Final 409A Regulations Include Important Modifications and Clarifications
Excerpt: "As many in the benefits community continue slogging through the 398-page release of the final 409A regulations, one analysis suggested it did not depart from the basic design and approach regulators took in the regulations' preliminary form." (PLANSPONSOR.com; free registration required)

Executive Remuneration Perspective: A Responsible Executive Pay Peer Group Selection Guide
Excerpt: "This Perspective outlines the factors that support effective peer group selection for pay evaluation and recommends key considerations for developing an appropriate and defensible peer group. When done right, peer group selection can become a foundation of compensation evaluation, grounding executive pay decisions in fact-based data and providing insight into external practices." (Mercer Human Resource Consulting LLC and Mercer Investment Consulting, Inc.; free registration required)

A Brief Review of New Benefits Bills In Congress
Excerpt: "from Spencer's Benefits Reports: Between March 29 and April 6, [several] benefits-related bills were introduced in Congress." (Wolters Kluwer Law & Business)

Hewitt Global Report: European Monthly Legislative Update (PDF)
5 pages. Excerpt: "[Hewitt's] monthly updates summarize recent legislative activity in Europe, by country, for the following issues: labor environment, cost of employment, employment terms and conditions, retirement and social security, health care system, taxation of compensation and benefits, and issues for expatriate employees." (Hewitt Associates)

Overview of DOL Enforcement Litigation Year to Date
The Department of Labor reports these enforcement actions for 2007 thus far. (Health Plan Law blog by Attorney Roy F. Harmon III)

Recent Graduates Looking at Benefits Packages That Come with New Jobs
Excerpt: "When you're looking for that first post-degree job, the tendency is to focus on salary in deciding which offer to take. But salary is just one piece of the financial package. A job with a lower salary may be worth more than a job with a higher salary because of medical, retirement and other benefits." (The Washington Post; free registration required)

Newly Posted Events

Final 409A Regulations Teleconference Series
Nationwide on April 19, 2007
presented by Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker LLP

Final 409A Regulations Teleconference Series
Nationwide on May 3, 2007
presented by Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker LLP

Final 409A Regulations Teleconference Series
Nationwide on May 10, 2007
presented by Paul, Hastings, Janofsky & Walker LLP

Section 409A Final Regulations: Advising Clients on the Final Rules for Nonqualified Deferred Compensation Plans
Nationwide on May 14, 2007
presented by ALI-ABA (American Law Institute-American Bar Association)

Section 409A: Final Regulations
in California on April 18, 2007
presented by Western Pension & Benefits Conference, San Francisco Chapter

Newly Posted Press Releases

The Canada Pension Plan - A Model for Social Security Reform?
AARP

Newly Posted or Renewed Job Openings

401k Conversion Implementation Project Manager
for Fidelity Investments
in KY, MA, TX

Director, Testing & Reporting Services
for Fidelity Investments
in KY, TX

Employee Benefits Associate
for Poyner & Spruill LLP
in NC

Assistant Director of Compensation and Benefits
for Mayer, Brown, Rowe & Mau LLP
in IL

Participant Services Representative
for Sentinel Benefits Group, Inc.
in MA

Manager, Benefit Communications and Training
for Reed Elsevier
in NY

Senior Product Analyst
for Transamerica Retirement Services
in CA

Daily Record Keeping Specialist
for AKT Retirement Plan Services LLC
in OR

Handy Links:

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