Practice management

We’re starting your week with three important facts, developments or conversations from recent and upcoming events. This week, we’ll look at why uninsured Americans’ hospital bills are so high, more official steps forward by HHS on public exchanges and HHS goals for tech improvements in 2013.

Nearly half of all health plan members in the group and individual markets nationwide say they are interested in using a state exchange to purchase health insurance, according to a new survey by J.D. Power and Associates.

A recent Schwab survey of planning students at Texas Tech found that the lure of client relationship management and working in-person with clients remains high, with nearly half of students citing the latter as a priority.

The industry has gone through an evolution in the way it delivers services to clients, the way businesses operate and the state of the competitive market. At some point in there, value added services became all the rage. But now we have a problem, says EBA Blogger Wendy Keneipp.

Try a little “brain-based sales and marketing,” suggests ASSPA’s Lisa Allen. Speaking about building a loyal client base this week at the ASSPA/NAPA 401(k) Summit, Allen offered the view that plan sponsors typically choose to work with an adviser because they find a “good personal fit,” then retroactively confirm that all of the objective and numbers-based reasons for that decision are in line.”

We’re starting your week with three important facts, developments or conversations from recent and upcoming events. This week, we look at the new IRS guidelines, final ruling from CMS on MLR ratio and what’s going on in Europe with retirement taxes.

Get ready for tip off. Sun Life Financial is set to offer brokers a new place to take employer clients and employees — the NBA basketball court.

How agents can help highly compensated executives save and remain competitive with safe harbor 401(k) by John Ludwig

EBA editor Elizabeth Galentine on why brokers should shift their focus.

A day in the life of Kristin Ash of Global Benefits Group

Sam Smith, a member of California’s SHOP exchange advisory group and president-elect of CAHU, predicts a bright future for adviser involvement in PPACA’s state health insurance.

Nelson Griswold on what insurance brokerages need to keep up with health reform.

John Lamb on how financial drivers of HIXs may outweigh traditional benefits approach.

Mel Schlesinger on how brokers, advisers can redesign a benefit proposal.

Jack Kwicien on how to engage clients in a meaningful way

Craig Davidson on what health insurance stores should look like under health reform.

According to most experts, the number is small and keeps getting smaller. We speak, of course, of the number of companies with 50 or more employees that will drop employer-sponsored insurance in 2014 - opting to send employees to state-run insurance exchanges and pay per-employee fines levied by the Patient Protection and Affordable Care Act. After a McKinsey & Company study in 2011 famously concluded that 30% of employers would "pay" rather than "play," survey after survey has revealed that fewer than 5% of employers plan to eliminate employee health benefits. Even the Government Accountability Office, which originally reported as much as 20% of employers would drop coverage, now has backed off that estimate to around 2%.

Twenty-seven years after women first complained in 1986 about bumping against an invisible barrier — dubbed the glass ceiling — when they aimed for top jobs, just 21 are chief executive officers of companies in the Standard & Poor’s 500 Index. Now, a rash of books, from Facebook Inc. Chief Operating Officer Sheryl Sandberg to former State Department official Anne-Marie Slaughter, are soon to be published, seeking to empower women.

A glass-half-full crowd of benefits brokers and agents – that could be the theme of this year’s National Association of Health Underwriters Capitol Conference. The organization concluded its three day lobbying stint Wednesday with a morning of discussion panels on health reform, remarks from a Republican congresswoman, a talk with a representative from Centers for Medicare and Medicaid and an address from NAHU’s president.

Buck Consultants is the latest benefit and consulting firm to form a private exchange. The move aims to reduce employer uncertainty about 2014 by reducing costs and increasing employee health care options.