Employer Strategies

A combination of regulatory, political and economic factors are set to create an uncertain environment for U.S. health care insurers, Moody's Investors Service reports, leading to a continuation of the negative outlook for the industry.

For some workers, it’s hard to get back in the swing of things after the highs and lows of the last two weeks of 2010. But the good news for employers is that there are inexpensive ways to ensure the post-holiday blues don’t interfere with employees’ engagement.

Anthem Blue Cross and Blue Shield is now offering its new Dental Prime and Complete programs on both a voluntary and employer-paid basis with three core plan designs to 40,000 small businesses and 79 chambers of commerce throughout Connecticut.

In a sign of the times, the 38 independent provider law firms associated with Pre-Paid Legal Services responded to more than 79,000 requests to handle debt-collection issues in the first half of 2010 – accounting for 7% of the 1.1 million overall requests for assistance during that timeframe.

Health care providers, attorneys and other service providers can breathe a collective sigh of relief.

Several leading service providers across the worksite-market landscape, hoping the economy heads northbound, are poised to reach higher ground in 2011. Consider a few of the most recent developments:

Over the last three decades, the job tenure for American women who work full time increased, while the length of time men workers stayed with an employer dropped, report researchers at the Employee Benefit Research Institute.

eSmartPayroll, an IRS and state-authorized online payroll and e-file servicer for a variety of tax forms, has released W2Manager.com, a new Web site that provides W-2 reporting or electronic filing to the states and federal government.

Employee benefits make up nearly 30% of compensation packages in the private sector, with insurance benefits comprising 8% of that total, according to 2010 research by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.

WageWorks Inc., which offers consumer-directed benefits solutions, recently acquired the tax-favored and benefits continuation administration business of Fringe Benefits Management Company (FBMC), which offers customized voluntary and core benefit products primarily in the public-sector market.