I’ve been in this business for 40 years and I continue to see the same thing that employers are doing every few years, and that is shuffling the chairs on the deck with insurance companies. It’s like Einstein‘s Definition Of Insanity.
Employer‘s seem to think that BUCA (Blue Cross, United, Cigna, Aetna) has all the answers. At the end of the day BUCA is simply selling their programs to employers and making massive amounts of money. Insurance companies don’t care what providers are charging because they just pass it on to employers and claim costs and premiums. The higher amounts that providers charge, the more profits insurance companies make.
When premiums or claim costs get too high with one insurance company, employers simply flip to another insurance company thinking that the world is going to be better. It’s the same stuff different day. It’s just a revolving door. It’s it shuffling the chairs on the deck and not resolving the real issues.
The way to lower costs is to move away from the insurance companies and use independent vendors to build a custom plan for your company. Get away from the bundled approach and unbundle the health plan using independent, Best In Class vendors rather than the behemoth insurance company.
Unbundling the health plan allows you to continue the same benefits to employees – the deductibles, copays, etc. – it’s simply changing the way you pay for them. The results will come and speak for themselves – 15 to 25% savings or more annually with better outcomes for employees at lower costs. You can even eliminate all out-of-pocket expenses by steering employees to the highest quality providers available, not just In Network providers that the insurance company wants you to use.
It doesn’t take much time and is easy to implement. You and your employees will be glad you did.
