<\/p>\n
As the benefit enrollment period approaching, employers are in the middle of their discussions with the insurance carriers.\u00a0 At a time when many small and midsize companies are on the brink of bankruptcy due to the COVID-19 crisis, many large insurance companies are having one of their best years.\u00a0 The costs associated with coronavirus claims are peanuts compared to the costs they\u2019ve avoided because most states have suspended elective surgeries like hip replacements and cataract removals until 2021.\u00a0 In addition, the insurance companies got massive support from the government coronavirus stimulus package, the HEROES Act.<\/p>\n
Seeing the struggle the employers are experiencing and some easy money the insurance companies are making this year, one may assume the insurance companies will be collaborating with employers on the health costs.\u00a0 Yeah, right!\u00a0 They are passing the expected jump in claims directly to employers in the form of health cost increases.<\/p>\n
According to\u00a0the Business Group on Health\u2019s annual survey<\/a><\/span>, the total cost of health benefits is expected to rise 5.3% in 2021.\u00a0 The increase is slightly higher than the 5% increases employers projected in each of the last five years.\u00a0 The history repeats itself.\u00a0 Once again, decade after decade, the growth of the employer health costs is greater than the inflation rate.\u00a0 For example, the 5-year breakeven inflation rate is currently around 1.5%.<\/p>\n As the enrollment period approaches, the real question is: Why are heads of HR departments and heads of benefits are accepting this bullying behavior from the insurance carriers?\u00a0 Here is the answer.\u00a0 First, some HR managers may actually believe that \u2018taking to the chin\u2019 from the insurance companies is normal and it\u2019s supposed to be this way.\u00a0 It\u2019s the cost of doing business.\u00a0 Second, as the saying in the industry goes, \u201cno head of benefits was ever fired by renewing with Cigna\u201d.\u00a0 Looking for alternative solutions takes time, generates tons of paperwork and creates \u2018unnecessary\u2019 questions from employees.<\/p>\n All these so-called explanations are pitiful.\u00a0 \u00a0Let\u2019s be honest and call it as it is.\u00a0 The CEOs and CFOs have fiduciary duty to their shareholders.\u00a0 The HR departments have fiduciary duty to their employees.\u00a0 All of a sudden, they forgot why they took this job in the first place \u2013 to benefit employees!\u00a0 By taking these draconian cost pass-throughs from the insurance companies and automatically renewing the health insurance plans, HR departments are violating their fiduciary duty.\u00a0 Plain and simple.<\/p>\n I strongly encourage heads of HR and CFOs to take a look at the technology solution created by WellAI to save on healthcare costs.\u00a0 Your employees would have a cool perk, our version of \u201cAlexa for Health\u201d.\u00a0 They would have fewer ER and doctor visits, experience state-of-the-art chronic disease management program (if needed) and talk to WellAI-trained telemedicine physicians who are using this super-modern machine learning technology to guide them in their diagnosis.<\/p>\n In other WellAI news, please don\u2019t forget to tune in to an educational show Advancements with Ted Danson on CNBC on Sunday, September 13, 2020, at 2:30pm EST.\u00a0 This episode of the show will discuss how WellAI is revolutionizing healthcare through innovations in machine learning.\u00a0 Press release is available\u00a0here<\/a><\/span>.<\/p>\n 10 days to launch!\u00a0 Please visit https:\/\/wellai.health<\/a><\/span>\u00a0to sign up.\u00a0 Let me know if you have any questions.<\/p>\n Please follow WellAI on\u00a0LinkedIn<\/a><\/span>,\u00a0 Twitter<\/a><\/span>,\u00a0 Facebook<\/a><\/span>,\u00a0 Instagram<\/a><\/span>,\u00a0 Telegram<\/a><\/span>\u00a0 and \u00a0YouTube<\/a><\/span>\u00a0for news and updates!<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" As the benefit enrollment period approaching, employers are in the middle of their discussions with the insurance carriers.\u00a0 At<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":3,"featured_media":52,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[129],"tags":[27,26,8,7,11],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"https:\/\/i0.wp.com\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-content\/uploads\/2020\/09\/2_zc_v1_52844000000451115-e1600004629618.jpeg?fit=1000%2C532&ssl=1","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/3"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=51"}],"version-history":[{"count":5,"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":569,"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/51\/revisions\/569"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/52"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=51"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=51"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/wellai.health\/blog\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=51"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}