Wellness

Why small employers haven’t bought into private exchanges — yet

It’s no surprise that the year ahead is going to mean skyrocketing voluntary sales. But experts say it’s no easy feat for health brokers trying to break into the business.

Health insurers are being asked by the U.S. government to be lenient with Obamacare customers who miss the Dec. 23 deadline for enrolling in the program or are late with their initial payment. Meanwhile, Aetna says it will not renew canceled plans.

Health and Human Services Secretary Kathleen Sebelius has asked the agency’s inspector general to review the development of Healthcare.gov, among other steps, in order to take “concrete action” and prevent future issues, she announced in a Wednesday blog post.

The U.S. Department of Health and Human Services told contractors not to cooperate with Congress’s efforts to investigate work related to the Obamacare website, a top Republican lawmaker said.

Here are two employers using biometric screenings to drive the larger message of healthy living home to their employees.

The University of Alabama has made impressive wellness strides by promoting and integrating their screening initiative in an overarching well-being campaign. For this collegiate employer, what is even more important than the health numbers stemming from biometrics is the context for those numbers.

More than 250,000 Americans selected private health insurance plans through Obamacare enrollment systems last month, better than twice as many as in October when the exchanges opened amid technology errors and outages.

Industry leaders discuss brokers’ to-dos for 2014, including technology developments and pending, unexpected competitors during a panel at Workplace Benefits Transitions.

President Barack Obama’s health agency said it has spent $319 million building an online health-insurance marketplace through October.