Agenda - 09-07-1999 - 8h - Laserfiche WebLink

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County Contribution for Employee Health Insurance Attached are the draft monthly health insurance rates for 2000. This shows the Total Cost, County Cost and Employee Cost for each coverage type. In the past the County has established its contribution for employee health insurance as the: ^ Full cost for individual employee coverage and ^ 40 percent of the cost of dependent coverage based on the Blue Cross Personal Care Plan rate. The County then has applied the dollar amount of the dependent contribution calculated on the Blue Cross Personal Care Plan rate to the Blue Cross Preferred Provider Plan and Healthsource plan rates. The attached rates have been calculated in this same manner. Budget for Health Insurance The County budget for fiscal year 1999-2000 provides funding for up to a 10 percent health insurance increase effective January 1, 2000. In dollars this is about $100,000. Based on the quoted renewal rates for 2000, the cost of the County contribution for individual coverage and dependent coverage are within the amount budgeted for health insurance for 1999-2000. The budget savings in 1999-00 yielded by the actual renewal rates quoted over the amount budgeted is about $45,000 to $50,000. Sole Provider Option The County also requested that the NCACC Trust provide a "sole provider" quote for the Blue Cross Plans through the Trust. If the County enters into a sole provider contract, this would mean discontinuing the current Healthsource plan effective January 1, 2000 and offering only the Blue Cross Plans. Employees enrolled in Healthsource would have to change to either the Blue Cross Preferred Provider Plan or the Blue Cross Personal Care Plan effective January 1. For the sole provider option, the NCACC Trust quoted rates that represent .7 (seven tenths) percent decrease over the current rates or about 5.2 percent less than the new rates. It is estimated this would yield a savings of about $55,000 in 1999-00 over the renewal rate quoted or about $110,000 on an annual basis. In the past, the County has considered the sole provider option but has decided not to pursue it because of the employee interest in maintaining choice in health insurance plans. Over the past two years, employee participation in the Healthsource plan has declined (from 166 employees in 1998 to 116 in 1999). It is anticipated that this trend will continue in 2000 given the Healthsource rate increase. Meanwhile, Blue Cross advises that it is planning to completely restructure its health plan offerings for 2001. Given the declining Healthsource participation and the potential for significant change in the Blue Cross plans in 2001, it is recommended that the County as part of its health insurance evaluation for January 1, 2001 coverage reevaluate the sole provider option and consider whether to pursue it as part of its health insurance renewal for 2001. FINANCIAL IMPACT: As explained in the budget section above, funds for the health insurance renewal are available in the approved budget for 1999-00. RECOMMENDATION(S): The Manager recommends the Board approve the renewal of the County health insurance plans and the attached health insurance rates effective January 1, 2000.