Client strategies

How many individuals and families that selected a health plan in the federally facilitated health insurance marketplace have paid their first month’s premium? Depends on whom you ask.

Despite a reliance on Healthcare.gov because their state-run exchange legislation was passed later than others, Idaho came out on top during open enrollment 2014 and the state has brokers to thank for a lot of it.

When the government announced last summer that it was delaying the employer mandate, many employers let out a sigh of relief. They relaxed. However, now it’s time to pick up the pace again. Before you know it, 2015 and 2016 will be here and the ACA will be an everyday reality for employers.

IRS issues annual health spending account contribution limits and out-of-pocket maximums.

Only a little over half of small businesses understand and are prepared for the changes required by the Affordable Care Act, according to a new survey.

When the public exchanges were first envisioned, some industry analysts thought most employers eventually would head for the exits on financing health benefits and simply steer their employees into the nascent online marketplace. That hasn’t happened, of course, and it’s far too early in the HIX rollout to expect any meaningful change to occur.

While just over half of employers in a recent survey said it was very important for a private exchange to accept ERISA fiduciary responsibilities for the plans purchased on the exchange, the reality is employers cannot offload their fiduciary responsibility by moving to a private exchange, say legal experts.

Brokers may be the best intermediary to communicate a matter of pediatric dental compliance to employers and medical carriers operating in numerous states as regulations shift.

As employers begin to look at private exchanges as a means to provide health care benefits to their active employee population questions are being raised about potential conflicts of interest for consulting firms that also act as exchange purveyors.

As new social media platforms arise, there are more opportunities for brokers to act as ‘trusted advisers.'

The ACA's first open enrollment period presented some expected — and some out-of-the-blue — challenges for carriers, agents and others tasked with enrolling millions of individuals on the health insurance exchanges. Those challenges should serve as lessons and preparation exercises for the next open enrollment, several industry experts advise.

A majority of Americans remain uninsured and many based the decision to stay uninsured on the cost of coverage, with many not even visiting an exchange to see a price estimate, a new study from consultancy Market Strategies International finds.

The six vexing questions employers want and need answers to in order to determine benefits.

Most Hispanics have a favorable view of the Affordable Care Act, but need more information about it to understand the law and how to enroll in the health insurance exchanges, HolaDoctor, a leading health website for Hispanics, says.

New research from a North American sample of HR leaders finds that the Affordable Care Act is not a primary concern among employers, even as the landmark health care law continues to worry the masses.

Whatever the Supreme Court’s decision in Hobby Lobby’s challenge to the Affordable Care Act’s contraception mandate, it won’t likely have broad implications for all employers, according to Howard Shapiro, partner and head of Proskauer’s ERISA litigation group in New Orleans.

Voluntary benefit sales are enjoying rapid growth as employers prepare for the impact of the Affordable Care Act by revamping their medical plan designs to include more products such as accident and critical illness benefits.

Employers are making creative changes to employee benefit offerings to stem the tide of rising health care costs, but many are taking a wait-and-see approach to private exchanges, according to presenters at MetLife’s 10th National Benefits Symposium Monday.

Forty-five percent of employers have implemented or plan to consider using a private exchange for their full-time active employees before 2018, according to a new employer survey conducted by the Private Exchange Evaluation Collaborative

The number of insurance agency mergers and acquisitions fell in 2013, with 248 reported transactions in the United States and Canada, down from a record 299 transactions in 2012, according to OPTIS Partners’ new semi-annual survey.