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EBP - Employee Benefit Plans
Tailoring
Benefits to Meet Hospitals' Needs
MCHC’s Employee Benefit Plan (EBP) and Trust helps your organization design
individualized employee benefit programs to meet your specific needs, while
negotiating fee schedules not available to individual institutions. Currently,
106 MCHC-member organizations participate in one or more of EBP’s programs.
EBP gives you access to a wide range of employee benefit programs and services, including:
· Health and dental insurance plans
– A self-insured Restricted Provider Organization (RPO)
– A Health Maintenance Organization (HMO Illinois), which is a
Blue Cross HMO
– A fully insured Preferred Provider Network (PPO)
– Consumer Driven Health Plans (CDHP)
– Managed care administration
· Life insurance plans and long-term disability plans
· Tax-deferred/Retirement savings programs
· A vision discount program
· Education programs
EBP acts as an administrative interface between your organization and specific insurance carriers, allowing your staff to choose their own level of administrative involvement. EBP collects payments, generates statistical reports and resolves disputes. In addition, EBP prepares a comprehensive health benefits analysis twice a year for participating organizations.
Reducing Employee Insurance Costs
MCHC’s Restricted Provider Organization (RPO) enables health care organizations to take advantage of their dual position as providers of health care and employers offering health insurance coverage to their employees. The RPO is a network of MCHC-member health care organizations that offer a discount on inpatient, outpatient and ancillary charges when employees of other network hospitals receive care at these institutions.
Providers are grouped into tiers that offer other network provider discounts that change on a quarterly basis for inpatient, outpatient and ancillary charges. As a result of these Council-negotiated discounts, RPO passbacks to participating hospitals exceeded $106 million in the past year.
The RPO is administered on a self-insured or fully insured basis, with claims administration provided by Blue Cross and Blue Shield of Illinois. Participants are given broad flexibility in plan design and the ability to purchase features such as stop-loss insurance and utilization review on medical, surgical and psychiatric services.
HMO Illinois (HMOI) offers another attractive alternative to conventional health insurance, with reduced administrative costs for members. The Council has negotiated lower fees with HMOI, which reduced premiums by nearly $1.69 million in 2003.
EBP offers three dental programs: Blue Cross/Blue Shield Indemnity and Preferred Choice plans; First Commonwealth Managed Choice and a dental HMO plan; and Delta Dental Premier, Delta Preferred Option and Delta Care. All three carriers offer a wide array of benefit choices for your employees.
Life Insurance and Long-Term Disability Programs ease administration and reduce costs. More than 7,600 participants take advantage of group, dependent, retiree, supplemental and universal life, accidental death and dismemberment programs, as well as basic and extended disability coverage, currently through Ft. Dearborn Life Insurance Company.
The Mid-America Vision discount program is free to all MCHC members. Employees of participating institutions save on vision care services through a network of optical shops, accessed by calling a toll-free number, 1-888-760-1010. In addition, RPO participants are automatically eligible for discounts at Eye-Med Vision Care, which includes LensCrafters, by presenting their Blue Cross and Blue Shield ID cards.
EBP has partnered with Worksite Solutions for the Voluntary Benefit Program.
Workside Solutions is a subsidiary of Aon. The Voluntary Benefit products are offered through the Combined Insurance Companies. Worksite Solutions provides a custom voluntary benefit package based on each individual’s needs. Each employee is given a custom benefit statement, which is comprised of all company benefits along with salary, showing their true compensation. One hour of pay per week is the maximum an employee can spend for these voluntary benefits. There is a one-on-one meeting with a salaried enroller (non-commission) offered at no charge to educate your employee. Benefit selections are funded through the convenience of payroll deduction.
Retirement Assistance
The family of companies provided by our sponsored financial group, Lincoln Alliance, offers a broad range of products and services – including retirement planning, financial planning, annuities and mutual funds.
The retirement program designs a clear, flexible solution that uses state-of-the-art technology supported by a highly skilled team of retirement professionals.
Providing Opportunities for Learning
Educational Programs sponsored by EBP cover topics such as financial planning, legislative updates and other current benefits topics.
EBP Trust
The EBP Board of Trustees is composed of members of MCHC’s Executive Committee, who approve new programs and offer direction and guidance to Council staff on current benefit programs. In addition to making recommendations to the board, the Committee on Human Resource Services monitors plan and trust operations and provides direction to staff regarding daily EBP activities.