TO To all Faculty and Staff eligible for benefits
FROM: HealthCare/Benefit Advisory Committee
-Marcia Bjornerud -Sandy Isselmann
-Joe Gregg -Patty Leiker
-Brian Riste -Dawn Rost
-Liz Miller
SUBJECT: Employee Benefits: 2012 Open Enrollment
Lawrence University’s benefits open enrollment/renewal process is once again approaching. This is your opportunity to:
- Enroll, change or drop Medical or Dental insurance coverage
- Add, change, or drop dependents
- Enroll in the Flexible Spending Account programs (must re-enroll each year)
- Health Care Spending Account
- Dependent Care Spending Account
- Enroll, drop or increase Optional Life Insurance election
- Review and update your beneficiary information
It is important for those covered or considering coverage under the Lawrence Health Plan to attend one of the Open Enrollment meetings this year since the health plan options will be changing effective July 1, 2012. Over the past several years, numerous employees have expressed difficulty in understanding the integrated Health Reimbursement Account (HRA) currently imbedded within the total annual deductible. As a result, the Benefit Advisory Committee has reviewed the current plan design and has recommended changes to the health plan options in order to simplify our plan design in addition to making our plan more sustainable, competitive, and affordable for employees and the university. Therefore, it is important for you to attend one of the Open Enrollment meetings to understand how the changes will impact you and your family. We will continue to offer two plan options including a lower and higher deductible plan. If you do not submit a change application to switch from our lower deductible plan to our higher deductible or vice versa, you will automatically be enrolled in the comparable plan based on your current election.
As a result of healthcare reform, Flexible Spending Account (FSA) limits for health related expenses will be reduced from $4,000 to $2,500 annually effective July 1, 2012. This change does not impact the dependent care limit of $5,000 per year. As always, your election from last year will not rollover into this plan year; therefore, you must re-enroll in this benefit during Open Enrollment.
As a reminder, dependent eligibility under the Care Plus plan was modified to cover dependent children to age 26 as of January 1, 2012. In order to provide consistency in the child dependent eligibility language between our health and dental plans, the Delta Dental dependent children eligibility language will be modified to cover dependents to age 26. This change will become effective July 1, 2012.
All other benefit coverage will remain the same for the upcoming plan year. If you have previously elected Optional Life insurance for you, your spouse/domestic partner or dependents, please keep in mind you may elect to increase your coverage during Open Enrollment by one increment without proof of good health up to the guarantee issue amount. For employees, you may increase by $10,000 up to $180,000 or 5 times basic annual salary, by $10,000 up to $50,000 for your spouse/domestic partner and by $2,500 up to $10,000 for dependent children.
As many of you are aware, the Benefit Advisory Committee and the university have made it a priority to hold health plan premiums flat for faculty and staff since the 2009-10 plan year for those who participated in a Health Risk Assessment (HRA). During this time the university has taken on the financial burden of our plan increases even though our health care costs have continued to rise. Based on our health plan utilization and medical inflation trending at 11%, the university is not able to absorb the entire cost of the increase this year. Therefore, employee premiums will be increasing by approximately 5% for the upcoming plan year. Even though health plan premiums will be increasing, I am pleased to share that Lawrence will continue to offer a health plan premium credit for those employees participating in the HRA program which is available through Thursday, April 19. Those who do not participate in the HRA will pay approximately 20 percent more than HRA participants for their monthly health insurance premium.
Dental premium rates for Care-Plus and Delta Dental will remain the same for the upcoming plan year.
This year, the open enrollment period will run May 1 to May 31. Applications for change need to be received in Human Resources by May 31. If you do not make any changes, all of your current elections will remain in effect except your current Flexible Spending Account (FSA) plan election. Changes made during the open enrollment period will be effective July 1, 2012. Enrollment/election forms will be made available at the Open Enrollment meetings and on-line after the meetings are complete.
To help you make informed choices about insurance elections, we are offering several informational meetings. We strongly recommend that ALL benefit eligible employees attend one of the meetings listed below. Attendees will have the opportunity to learn more about the changes, review the benefit descriptions, and ask questions. Open Enrollment meetings will be held at the Warch Campus Center Cinema on the dates listed below. You do not need to sign-up to attend one of the meetings.
- Tuesday, April 24 from 11:30a to 12:30p
- Tuesday, May 1 from 9:00 to 10:00a
- Wednesday, May 2 from 2:30 to 3:30p or 4:30 to 5:30p
If you are unable to attend one of the open enrollment meetings, a voiceover PowerPoint presentation of the plan options, benefit changes, premium costs, resources and enrollment/change forms will be made available in early May. An announcement will be made via email when these resources are available.
Again, your attendance at one of the meetings is strongly encouraged due to the changes this year. If you have additional questions, please contact Human Resources at ext. 6564. Thank you!
Sandy Isselmann
Director of Human Resources
Lawrence University
Brokaw Hall-Room 108
Phone: 920-832-6541
Fax: 920-993-6026
www.lawrence.edu
