July 30, 2019

New Health Savings Account, HDHP limits for 2020

The IRS has announced new health savings account contribution maximums for the 2020 health insurance plan year.

Employees who have an HSA linked to a high-deductible health plan (HDHP) will be able to contribute to their HSA up to a certain level to help pay for health care and pharmaceutical expenses.

Funds going into your employees’ HSA accounts are deducted before taxes during each paycheck and the balance can be carried over from year to year.

Many HSAs also allow employees to invest the funds like they would with a 401(k). Because of this, HSAs have become a savings vehicle of sorts for people who are saving for health care expenses they are expecting in retirement.

HSAs can only be offered with an attached HDHP.

If you as an employer also contribute or partially match your employees’ contributions, they benefit even more, especially when compounding investment returns build up in the long term.

The IRS adjusts contribution limits for HSAs yearly based on inflation. For 2020, those limits will be:

  • $3,550 for individual coverage under an attached HDHP (up $50 from 2019).
  • $7,100 for family coverage (up $100 from 2019).

Also, remember that individuals who are 55 or older can make an additional $1,000 in catch-up contributions.

Besides the contribution maximum increasing, the deductible requirement for an attached HDHP will also climb for 2020:

  • For individual HDHPs, the deductible amount must be between $1,400 and $6,900. That’s compared with $1,350 and $6,750 in 2019.
  • For families, the range is $2,800 to $13,800. That’s up from $2,700 and $13,600 in 2019.

Long-term benefits

One of the best benefits from an HSA is the long-term advantage of being able to carry over balances year after year and let it build up for medical expenses in retirement. But, one of the key points that your employees should know is that if they use the funds in their HSAs for purposes other than qualified medical expenses, they have to pay a 20% penalty.

The website Investopedia recommends that your employees:

  • Max out their HSA contribution each year. If they do so, the amount they can save over the long term only grows through compounding.
  • Hold off on spending contributions now, and try to not use HSA funds for current medical expenses.
  • Make sure they only use the money for qualified medical expenses, so they don’t have to pay penalties of 20% plus regular income tax on their withdrawals.
  • Invest contributions for the long run. For example, if you’re currently invested in a mix of 80% stocks and 20% bonds, you should probably invest your HSA that way, too.
  • Use the account once they’re 65 or older. An added benefit to waiting until you’re at least 65 to spend your HSA balance is that the 20% penalty for withdrawing funds for purposes other than qualified medical expenses doesn’t apply. But, you will have to pay income tax if you don’t use the funds for qualified medical expenses.
July 23, 2019

40 States Sue Generic Drug Makers for Collusion

The heat is growing on the pharmaceutical industry after more than 40 US states filed a lawsuit accusing generic drug makers of engaging in a massive price-fixing scheme.

The lawsuit accuses 20 companies of conspiring to fix prices of more than 100 generic drugs, including some that are used to treat cancer and diabetes. The defendants include the largest producer of generic medicine in the world: Teva Pharmaceuticals.

The new lawsuit comes after a five-year investigation that uncovered a scheme through which “coordinated price hikes on identical generic drugs became almost routine,” according to an investigative report by the Washington Post. The suit covers the period from July 2013 to January 2015.

The companies and executives would “routinely communicate with one another directly, divvy up customers to create an artificial equilibrium in the market” to keep generic drug prices artificially high, the lawsuit says.

The scale of the alleged collusion was summed up by Joseph Nielsen, an assistant attorney general and antitrust investigator in Connecticut, whose office has taken the lead in the investigation: “This is most likely the largest cartel in the history of the United States,” he told the Washington Post last December.

In announcing the recent lawsuit, he cited e-mails, text messages, telephone records and testimony from former company executives that indicate a “multi-year conspiracy to fix prices and divide market share for huge numbers of generic drugs.”

This is not the only litigation. Pharmacies and other businesses have filed their own lawsuits against the generic drug makers. One such suit documents huge price hikes – like a 3,400% increase in the price of an anti-asthma medication – and investigators believe that generic drug producers colluded to raise prices in tandem or not make their products available in some markets or through specific pharmacy chains.

Significance of the states’ suit

The multi-state lawsuit is important because generics account for 90% of pharmaceutical spending in the U.S. Despite that, they only account for 23% of the total drug spend in the country, according to the Association for Accessible Medicines.

With so many prescriptions being written, the savings to consumers could be huge if the drug makers are found to have fixed pricing and they subsequently change their ways. What’s not clear, though, is whether it would actually spur changes in pricing by the companies.

According to the lawsuit, the drug companies allegedly conspired to manipulate prices on dozens of medicines between July 2013 and January 2015.

It accuses Teva and others of “embarking on one of the most egregious and damaging price-fixing conspiracies in the history of the United States.”

Connecticut Attorney General William Tong, who filed the suit, said the investigation had exposed why the cost of health care and prescription drugs was so high in the U.S.

July 16, 2019

Congress, Administration Serious About Tackling Health Care Costs

As more people struggle with their medical bills, Congress has been introducing a raft of new legislation aimed at cutting costs and making pricing more transparent.

The multi-pronged, bipartisan effort targets the lack of transparency in pricing particularly for pharmaceuticals, as well as surprise medical bills that have left many Americans reeling, and there are also other efforts aimed at reducing the cost burden on payers: the general public and employers.

And since consumers are affected regardless of their political affiliation, congresspersons are reaching across the aisle to push through legislation to address this crushing problem.

There are several draft proposals, but word is a number of bills are expected to be introduced soon.

Surprise medical bills

One of the top priorities seems to be surprise medical bills, which are in the administration’s crosshairs. President Trump in January 2019 hosted a roundtable to air the problems people face when hit with what are often financially devastating surprise bills after they venture out of their network for medical services for both emergency and scheduled medical visits.

After the roundtable, he directed a bipartisan group of lawmakers to create legislation that would provide relief. The House Energy and Commerce Committee in May responded by introducing draft legislation that aims to ban surprise medical bills.

Also, Sen. Maggie Hassan (D-N.H.) and Sen. Bill Cassidy (R-La.) have said they hope to introduce legislation to end the practice of surprise bills. With the White House and both sides of the aisle talking the talk, observers say that there are a number of ways legislation could tackle these surprise bills. That could include:

  • Setting caps on how much hospitals and service providers can charge, or
  • Requiring hospitals and service providers to turn to the insurance company (and not the patient) when they are seeking additional reimbursement.
  • Requiring the insurer to share more of the cost burden for the out-of-network services.

At this point legislation is still being formulated, but chances are good that we could see a bipartisan push to fix this problem. The biggest issue will be how to calculate what are “reasonable” costs for out-of-network services.

Pharmaceutical costs, transparency

The Trump administration has also made it a priority to reduce the costs of medications and tackle pricing transparency in the system.

While both Republicans and Democrats have decried the skyrocketing costs of prescription medications, the inflation for which is outpacing all other forms of medical care, so far there has been only one piece of legislation introduced tackling transparency.

Unfortunately, it’s part of a larger bill that aims to preserve the Affordable Care Act and reverse some recent policy decisions by the Trump administration, so the chances of that measure going anywhere in the Senate are slim to none.

The good news is that members from both parties have been talking about cooperating on legislation, and political observers say the chances are good some type of measure will be introduced this summer.

Other costs

Sen. Ron Wyden (D-Ore.) in February introduced legislation that would require insurers to tell people what they would have to pay out of pocket for any in-network treatment or prescription drug.

On top of that, the Senate Health Committee will soon introduce a number of bills aimed at reducing frictional costs in the system.

In addition, the Senate Finance and Judiciary committees are both in the process of formulating measures aimed at reducing health care costs, as well as prescription drug prices.

July 9, 2019

Insurers Will Pay Record Amount of Rebates to Small Group Plans

While most businesses rarely get rebate checks from their group health insurer, this year may be different as insurance companies are expected to pay back record excess premiums, as required by the Affordable Care Act.

The landmark insurance law requires that insurers spend at least 80% of their premium income on medical care and medications, but expected payouts in 2018 came in way below expectations. That means they have to pay out rebates for the overcharge.

Analysts expect that insurers will pay out $1.4 billion in rebates, $600 million of which would be paid to small and large group health plans, according to a report by the Kaiser Family Foundation.

The reason for the sizeable expected rebate is that insurers raised rates substantially for 2018, which was right after Congress had passed a law that eliminated the individual mandate penalty, as well as uncertainty about the law after the Trump administration introduced regulations to expand the use of short-term health plans and association plans.

As mentioned, plans must spend 80% of premiums they collect on medical claims or quality improvements if they are in the individual or small group market. The threshold is 85% in the large group market. The rest can be spent on claims administration, marketing and other overhead, as well as set aside for profit.

Rebates to small group plan and large group plan members have typically overshadowed rebates to those who purchase plans individually on government-run exchanges. In 2017, according to the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services, insurers paid out nearly $707 million in ACA rebates, as follows:

  • $132.5 million to individual market enrollees.
  • $309.4 million to small group market enrollees.
  • $264.8 million to large group market enrollees.

But this year, rebates to the individual market are expected to be $800 million, while the remaining $600 million would be paid to enrollees in group plans.

The premium increases that many insurers pushed through led to much higher rates – benchmark premiums were up 34% going into 2018 – because of market uncertainties, such as:

  • In October 2017, the Trump administration ceased payments for cost-sharing subsidies, which led some insurers to exit the market or request larger premium increases than they would have otherwise.
  • The administration reduced funding for advertising and outreach.
  • Congress repealed the individual mandate penalty, effective for 2019.
  • The administration introduced regulations extending the time people could be on short-term plans, and also introduced association health plans as an alternative for the small group market.

But the insurers’ fears didn’t materialize. Despite payments per enrollee growing 26% to $559 in 2017 on exchanges, per person claims increased only 7% to $392 year over year.

Also, the repeal of the penalties and increased premiums did not drive younger, healthier consumers out of the marketplace as had been expected.

How to disburse rebates

If you are one of the employers whose health plan gets to receive a rebate, the big question that always comes up is “how do you distribute the funds?”

ACA regulations require insurers to pay rebates directly to the group health plan policyholder, who will be responsible for ensuring that employees benefit from the rebates to the extent they contributed to the cost of coverage.  

But remember, since you as the employer also contributed to the premiums, you are entitled to your portion of the rebate. Your take should be in the same proportion as the premium you pay compared to your employees.

The way that you disburse the rebate is up to you, but whatever you do, it must be in accordance with ERISA’s general standards of fiduciary conduct.

Typically, if the rebate works out to be small for each participant, it would likely not be worth your time to cut each employee a check.

The preferred method in most cases is to provide the rebate in the form of a premium reduction or discount to all employees participating in the plan at the time the rebate is distributed.

July 4, 2019

New Rule Allows Employers to Pay Workers to Buy Their Own Health Coverage

The Trump administration has issued new rules that would allow employers to provide workers with funds in health reimbursement accounts (HRAs) that can be used to purchase health insurance on the individual market.

The rule reverses a long-standing part of the Affordable Care Act that carried hefty fines of up to $36,500 a year per employee for applicable large employers that are caught providing funds to workers so they can buy insurance.

The rule was put in place to keep employers from shunting unhealthy or older workers from their group health plans into private insurance and government-run marketplaces.

Under the rules issued by the Departments of Health and Human Services, Labor and Treasury, employers would be authorized to fund, on a pre-tax basis, health reimbursement funds that to buy ACA-compliant plans. The new rules take effect Jan. 1, 2020.

With the final rules written in a way to keep employers from trying to reduce their group benefit costs by sending sicker and older workers into the individual market, HHS noted in a press release announcing the rule that it would closely monitor employers to make sure this type of adverse selection doesn’t occur.

Typically, HRAs have only been allowed to be used to reimburse workers for out-of-pocket medical expenses. This rule allows them to also be used to pay for health insurance premiums for coverage that a worker may secure on their own.

’Integration’ conditions

The regulation permits an HRA to be “integrated” with certain qualifying individual health plan coverage. In order to be integrated with individual market coverage, the HRA must meet several conditions:

  • Any individual covered by the HRA must be enrolled in health insurance coverage purchased in the individual market, and must substantiate and verify that they have such coverage;
  • The employer may not offer the same class of individuals both an HRA and a “traditional group health plan”;
  • The employer must offer the HRA on the same terms to all employees in a “class”;
  • Employees must have the ability to opt out of receiving the HRA;
  • Employers must provide a detailed notice to employees on how the HRAs work;
  • Employers may not create a class of employees younger than age 25, whom they might want to keep in their group plan because they’re healthier.
  • For employers with one to 100 employees, a class cannot have less than 10 employees; for employers with 100 to 200 employees, the minimum class size is 10% of the workforce; and for employers with 200 or more employees, the minimum class size is 20 employees.

While the HRA money can be used mostly for buying plans that meet ACA requirements, employers under the rule can establish a special type of “excepted benefit” HRA for employees who want to buy less expensive short-term plans that do not comply with the ACA.  The contribution for such plans would be capped at $1,800 a year.

Under the ACA, employers with 50 or more full-time workers (applicable large employers) must provide their employees with health insurance that covers 10 essential minimum benefits and must be “affordable.”

Under the new rule, an applicable large employer could meet their obligation if they provide adequate HRA contributions for employees to buy individual coverage.