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Consumer driven health plans continue to grow in popularity despite a waning impact on cost control, according to preliminary results in a recent United Benefits Advisors survey.

A new report from EAP provider ComPsych suggests that employees’ emotional health likely will not support healthy lifestyle changes -- indicating that stress, anxiety, depression and poor social support may be hampering employees' efforts to achieve wellness goals.

Starbucks Coffee Co. has agreed to pay $75,000 to settle a disability discrimination lawsuit brought on behalf of a Texas barista who said she was fired because she was a dwarf.

Four years from now, the median account balance of a defined contribution plan assets will reach $150,000, up from $100,000 today—a decent-sized nest egg by most standards, but a far cry from the $1 million or more experts say is needed to sustain a retiree’s lifestyle and health care costs.

Women who are in the middle of a transition — whether it be a divorce, the death of a spouse, or the inheritance of a large sum of money — often need specialized financial advice, but many of them may not know where to go, says Kimberly Howard, founder and owner of KJH Financial Services in Needham, Mass.

A failure to process claims in a timely manner and a failure to use compliant policy forms top the list of complaints filed in the P&C and life/health insurance markets, according to Wolters Kluwer Financial Services. Other continuous challenges cited were a failure to properly embed regulatory requirements into claims, underwriting and distribution processes.

The Obama administration last week issued regulations intended to improve employees’ understanding of their health plan options, as called for by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act.

In a follow-up post, Steve Kloyda talks further about the art of prospecting. Do you agree with his thoughts? Your success in sales starts and ends with prospecting Skeptics say that prospecting is dead. It’s not. And it never will be. The decision to prospect is yours alone. Yes, the old way of selling has changed, but prospecting continues to be the foundation of all successful businesses and salespeople. So what is prospecting? …

With uncertain economic times having American employees highly stressed and otherwise emotionally on edge, it doesn’t come as much of a surprise that a new survey from CareerBuilder shows that 34% of hiring managers say they’re placing greater emphasis on emotional intelligence when hiring and promoting employees post-recession.

Although concerned about challenges in the business environment, brokers and consultants are confident they will find a variety of ways to prosper, according to MetLife’s Broker and Consultant Study released last week.