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Milliman
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Cammack Retirement Group
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Account Manager
Cammack Retirement Group
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Epic Insurance
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Owen-Dunn Insurance Services
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Retirement Solution Group, LLC
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DF Pensions, Inc.
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The Vivity Case Study: How Anthem Converted Adversaries Into Partners
February 11, 2015 WEBCAST
(Atlantic Information Services, Inc.)

Nonqualified Plans: Uncovering Trends and Overcoming Challenges
February 24, 2015 WEBCAST
(ProCourse Fiduciary Advisors, LLC)

Human Resources Conference
April 22, 2015 in NY
(Strategic Benefit Services)

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[Official Guidance]

Text of IRS Notice 2015-6: Reporting Sick Pay Paid by Third Parties (PDF)
"This notice provides that [IRS] Form 8922, Third-Party Sick Pay Recap, must be used by third parties and employers to report total payments of certain sick pay paid by third parties on or after January 1, 2014. In particular, Form 8922 must be used for filing 'third-party sick pay recaps' to reconcile the reporting of sick pay paid by a third party on behalf of employers to employees in situations in which the liability for the [FICA] taxes on the sick pay is split between the employer and the third party under applicable regulations." (Internal Revenue Service [IRS])  

[Advert.]

DATAIR! More Choices – Better Guidance – Less Cost

FSA, DCAP, Full-Flex, HRA, HSA, 132(f)
Documents, SPDs, Amendments, Administrative Forms
(888) 328-2474   Sales@DATAIR.com   www.DATAIR.com

[Guidance Overview]

Proposed Rule Changes Include Limited Wraparound Coverage as 'Excepted Benefits' (PDF)
"The proposed regulations provide the ability to offer limited wraparound coverage if their benefits wrap around either: [1] 'Eligible individual health insurance' plan (e.g., a plan purchased through an exchange), or [2] A Multi-State Plan (i.e., a specific type of plan offered in the Exchange). These two mutually exclusive options on the use of wraparound coverage are outlined in [a table in this article], with the requirements to be an 'excepted benefit' listed in [a second table]." (Cheiron)  

[Guidance Overview]

New Jersey Enacts Health Information Encryption Requirement
"The law applies to any insurance company, health service corporation, hospital service corporation, medical service corporation, or health maintenance organization authorized to issue health benefits plans in New Jersey. These entities must take steps to protect 'individually identifiable health information' that they compile through encryption or 'by any other method or technology rendering it unreadable, undecipherable, or otherwise unusable by an unauthorized person,' according to the legislation. The law will become effective on August 1, 2015.... New Jersey now joins Massachusetts and Nevada in imposing specific security requirements for the protection of personal information that arguably go beyond federal law." (Alston & Bird LLP, via Lexology)  

[Guidance Overview]

Massachusetts Amends Parental Leave Law to Give Leave Rights to Male Employees
"Prior to the amendment, the [Massachusetts Maternity Leave Act (MMLA)] provided eight weeks of job-protected leave to female employees for the birth or adoption of a child. With this amendment, leave under the MMLA is extended to males as well as females. Further, the MMLA now also covers leave for the placement of a child with an employee pursuant to a court order.... [T]he MMLA limits the amount of leave that parents working in the same company can obtain, stating that any two employees of the same employer are entitled only to eight weeks of parental leave for the birth or adoption of the same child." (Jackson Lewis P.C.)  

White House Unveils New Steps to Strengthen Working Families Across America
"The President will: Call on Congress to pass the Healthy Families Act.... Call on States and cities to pass similar laws.... Outline a new plan to help more states create paid leave programs.... Provide new funding for feasibility studies.... Propose legislation to provide paid family leave to federal workers.... Take action to modernize federal parental leave policy." (The White House Blog)  

What Trade Secrets? BCBSNC Discloses Reimbursements
"Blue Cross and Blue Shield of North Carolina has unveiled a new public website comparing the costs of about 1,200 procedures across its providers networks -- an attempt to offer consumers a guide in the great morass of healthcare reimbursement, and also a risky move that may leave some providers feeling underpaid.... The public database's 1,200 procedures represent about 80 percent of the insurers' non-emergency healthcare spending, and predictably, it shows a wide variation in payments across facilities and geographies." (Healthcare Payer News)  

The Rising Cost of Living Longer: Analysis of Medicare Spending by Age for Beneficiaries in Traditional Medicare
"In 2011, beneficiaries ages 80 and older comprised 24 percent of the traditional Medicare population, but 33 percent of total Medicare spending on this population. In contrast, beneficiaries between the ages of 65 and 69 comprised 26 percent of the traditional Medicare population, but just 15 percent of total Medicare spending. In 2011, overall Medicare per capita spending increased with age, peaked at age 96, and then declined gradually for the relatively small number of beneficiaries at older ages. Average Medicare per capita spending in 2011 more than doubled between age 70 ($7,566) and age 96 ($16,145)." (Henry J. Kaiser Family Foundation)  

Stage Is Set: Predicting State and Federal Reactions to King v. Burwell (PDF)
11 pages. "If Congress chooses not to take corrective action following a [U.S. Supreme Court] ruling in favor of King, contingency plans for maintaining access to insurance subsidies will fall to the states.... [E]ach contingency option will vary on the time necessary for implementation, costs necessary to reach compliance and state political obstacles to overcome. Not all of these options tenably ensure continuous subsidy distribution without some disruption." (Leavitt Partners)  

Will Multistate Health Plans Be Agents for Competition or for Consolidation? (PDF)
25 pages. "The [Multi-State Plan (MSP)] Program provides the Office of Personnel Management with new authority to negotiate and implement multistate insurance plans on all health insurance exchanges with in the United States.... [T]he MSP Program may lead to further consolidation of the health insurance industry despite the program's stated goal of increasing competition by means of health insurance exchanges. The MSP Program arguably gives a competitive advantage to large insurers, which already dominate health insurance markets.... [T]he MSP Program's failure to produce increased competition may motivate a new effort for a public health insurance option." (Mercatus Center, George Mason University)  

Alaska Health Plan Premiums, Highest in Nation, Are Triple Those in Phoenix
"In this second year of the insurance marketplaces created by the federal health law, the most expensive premiums are in rural spots around the nation: Wyoming, rural Nevada, patches of inland California and the southernmost county in Mississippi ... Starting this month, the cheapest silver plan for a 40-year-old in Alaska costs $488 a month. (Not everyone will have to pay that much because the health law subsidizes premiums for low-and moderate-income people.) A 40-year-old Phoenix resident could pay as little as $166 for the same level[.]" (Kaiser Health News)  

More Americans Could Afford to Pay Their Medical Bills in First Year of ACA Enrollment
"The number of Americans reporting they did not receive needed health care because of its cost dropped for the first time since 2003, falling from 80 million in 2012 to 66 million ... And the number saying they had trouble paying their medical bills or were paying off medical debt fell from 75 million in 2012 to 64 million -- the first time it declined since this question was initially asked in 2005." (The Commonwealth Fund)  

[Opinion]

Why Paid Sick Leave Is a Worker's Right, Not a Privilege
"President Obama will call on Congress to pass the Healthy Families Act, which would allow millions of working Americans to earn up to seven days a year of paid sick time -- and call on states and cities to pass similar laws. The President will outline a new plan to help states create paid leave programs, and provide new funding through the [DOL] for feasibility studies that will help other states and municipalities figure out the best way to implement programs of their own. And the President will sign a Presidential Memorandum that will ensure federal employees have access to at least 6 weeks of paid sick leave when a new child arrives and propose that Congress offer 6 weeks of paid administrative leave as well." (Valerie Jarrett, Senior Advisor to President Barack Obama and Chair of the White House Council on Women and Girls)  

[Opinion]

More Than a Third of American Workers Don't Get Sick Leave, and They're Making the Rest of U.S. Ill
"Nationally, nearly 4-in-10 private sector workers -- 39 percent -- do not have access to any sick leave at all. Zero. Zilch. None.... [T]hat amounts to 43.5 million workers who may be compelled by financial reasons to come into the office when they're sniffling, sneezing, barfing, and generally feeling under the weather, making the rest of us ill in the process.... 88 percent of private sector managers and financial workers have access to paid leave, more than double the rate among service workers (40 percent) and construction workers (38 percent)." (The Washington Post; subscription may be required)  

How to Win an ERISA Estoppel Claim in the First Circuit
"The Court explained that an equitable estoppel claim can be based on statements extrinsic to the plan documents where they concern an ambiguous term in the plan, but not otherwise. Thus, the first hurdle for proving an estoppel claim in the First Circuit -- if you are lucky enough to be the lawyer or participant in the case where the Court finally agrees that such a claim exists under the law -- is to demonstrate that the plan is ambiguous with regard to a provision related to the extrinsic statement in question." [Guerra-DelGado v. Popular, Inc., No. 13-2065 (1st Cir. Dec. 18, 2014)] (Stephen Rosenberg of The Wagner Law Group)  

ProCourse Renews Certification for Fiduciary Excellence
ProCourse Fiduciary Advisors, LLC

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