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WEB Chicago Chapter Meeting - Building a Structure of Well-Being
in Illinois on September 26, 2012 presented by Ogletree Deakins

Fee Disclosures Have Arrived. Confusion Reigns. Here's How to Deal with It! (NY CLE Program)
in New York on September 14, 2012 presented by WEB (Worldwide Employee Benefits Network ), New York Chapter

"457(b) Plans for 401(k) Practitioners" Web Seminar - New Date
Nationwide on August 28, 2012 presented by SunGard Relius

Retirement Plan Distributions: Design and Planning Webcast
Nationwide on August 29, 2012 presented by American Society of Pension Professionals & Actuaries (ASPPA)

Top-heavy Plans and Coverage Testing Webcast
Nationwide on September 10, 2012 presented by American Society of Pension Professionals & Actuaries (ASPPA)

CFDD

 

Eleventh Circuit Affirms Wellness Program Complies with Americans with Disabilities Act (PDF)
"The Eleventh Circuit affirmed the lower court's ruling that the wellness program constitutes a bona fide benefit plan because it is part of a condition or 'a term' under the County's group health insur.ance plan. Although this is a positive outcome for employers, questions—and risks—remain. This case does not bind courts outside the Eleventh Circuit (Alabama, Florida, and Georgia) or the EEOC to make similar rulings. So, for example, other courts could reject the bona fide benefit plan safe harbor and rule on the voluntary wellness program exception issue." (Buck Consultants)

[Advert.]

Weight Loss At the Workplace: Legal Issues For Employers Seeking To Reduce Health Care Costs

Learn the issues used to identify and address when formulating and implementing a corporate wellness program that is aimed at weight loss. Discounted pricing for BenefitsLink readers.

Single-Payer Drug Coverage
"Of the 33 new oncology drugs [considered in this] study, 30 were approved in the United States ... but only 24 were permitted in Can.ada between 2003 and 2011. The median review times of these drugs were 182 days in the United States... and 356 days in Can.ada.... [I]n addition to delayed access, Can.ada's health care system failed to provide assistance in receiving the oncology drugs crucial to check the high fatality rate from cancer." (John Goodman's Health Policy Blog)

Health Insur.ance Rate Regulation Measure Qualifies for California's November 2014 Ballot
"An initiative that would bring health insur.ance rate regulation to California has qualified for the November 2014 ballot, setting the stage for a vigorous and costly battle between insurers and consumer groups. The measure ... would give the state insur.ance commissioner the power to deny certain premium increases if they are deemed excessive. The insur.ance commissioner has little control over such rate hikes now." (Silicon Valley MercuryNews)

Consumer-Directed Health Plans Can Present Trap for Unwary Medicare-Eligible Employees
"Many employers are adopting consumer driven health plans. Did you know that some of these plans don't count as credible coverage for Medicare Part D? If you have a member of your workforce who's working beyond retirement age and enrolls in a plan that doesn't meet Medicare's prescriptions guidelines, they could pay a higher rate for their Medicare plans for the rest of their lives." (Employee Benefit News)

Is a Health Savings Account Right for You?
"[M]ore employers are offering to make contributions into an HSA as an incentive to get their employees to enroll in the high deductible plans. Most employers and employees can lower their premiums by 40 percent with a high deductible HSA-qualified health insur.ance plan compared to a conventional co-pay plan." (CBS MoneyWatch)

Rising Health Care Costs Are an Economic, Not a Budget, Problem
"While federal budget deficits in recent years have been driven by the Great Recession and its aftermath, long-term fiscal issues are driven almost solely by rising health care costs. These growing government health costs, however, are the direct result of a larger economic problem: the failure of our dysfunctional health system to contain costs." (Economic Policy Institute)

Implementing Insur.ance Exchanges—Lessons from Europe
"Citing the experiences of the Netherlands and Switzerland—where exchanges have been part of the health care landscape for some time—the authors of this [article] argue that additional measures will be needed to control costs and improve quality." (The Commonwealth Fund)

Eleventh Circuit Turns Back ADA Challenge to Employer's Wellness Program
"[The employer's] benefits manager testified that the wellness program was not contained within the four corners of the group health insur.ance plan documents. This, the plaintiffs argued, caused the program to fall outside the ADA's safe harbor because it was not a 'term' of the group health insur.ance plan. The court reasoned that the 'term' reference did not require that the program be set out in the benefit plan document itself." [Seff v. Broward County] (Littler Mendelson P.C.)

The Evolution of Retiree Health Care Strategy Post-Health Care Reform (PDF)
"[The 2012 Retiree Health Care Survey] shows the continued trend toward reducing or eliminating retiree health care coverage, which generally began with the introduction of retiree welfare accounting standards in the early 1990s for private employers.... [A]bout half of plan sponsors surveyed have stand-alone retiree health care plans and can avoid the new group insur.ance market reforms for their retiree populations. Going forward, more plan sponsors may choose to split their legal plans in order to exempt retiree-only plans from any new group insur.ance market requirements that may be introduced in the future." (Aon Hewitt)

Want to Attract Jobs to Your Area? Get Healthier Says Expert
"[Dr. James S. Marks], a former staff member of the Centers for Disease Control, who also served as Assistant Surgeon General, noted that areas with lower obesity rates typically offer lower health care costs and higher productivity associated with its workers." (LVB.com)

[Opinion]

Health Care: An Alternate Economic Universe
"Compared to the rest of the economy, health care seem to exist in an alternate economic universe. This would be good news, rather than a problem, if we were not borrowing roughly half of every dollar of general revenue the federal government is spending on health care and if employers were not robbing their workers of wage increases to fund their health benefits." (HealthAffairs Blog)

Are Banks Soft-Pedaling Clawbacks?
"At a time when news of banking scandals is uncomfortably frequent, a new report says that last year only 17% of global banking organizations 'clawed back' compensation payments previously made to employees. The survey ... was not expansive, with only 42 banks participating (in addition to 18 insur.ance companies and three other types of firms). Still, the results may suggest that regulators are not achieving the objectives of their persistent calls for banks to implement clawback policies." (CFO)

Employee or Independent Contractor: Tips for Avoiding Employee Misclassification
"If a worker's classification is still unclear, the employer (or the worker) can file a Form SS-8, Determination of Worker Status for Purposes of Federal Employment Taxes and Income Tax Withholding, with the IRS. The IRS will review the facts and circumstances and officially determine the worker's status. Be aware that it can take at least six months to get a determination, but a business that continually hires the same types of workers to perform particular services may want to consider filing the form." (hr360)

Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard OKs Domestic Partner Benefits
"After wavering on the issue for weeks, Indianapolis Mayor Greg Ballard signed off Thursday on an ordinance providing domestic partner benefits for city and county workers. The mayor overcame his discomfort with the inclusion of employees' unmarried opposite-se.x partners—who, as Ballard had pointed out, already have the option of marrying." (Indy Star)

More Employers Planning to Change HR Structure to Improve Delivery of Services, Towers Watson Survey Finds
Towers Watson

National Business Group on Health Elects Three Board Members
National Business Group on Health

Firm Offers No Cost Fee Benchmarking Service
Retirement Desk