And So It Begins
From "Heath Care Reform Update," a letter distributed this week to employees of Stanford University:
Beginning January 1, 2011, Stanford Benefits will start integrating into our health plans changes mandated by the federal Health Care Reform law....The new health care legislation includes numerous regulations, requirements and fees that become effective between 2011 and 2018. In light of these changes, the University will be carefully reviewing the design of its employee and retiree health plans....
You will no longer be able to use your health care spending account to be reimbursed for over-the-counter medication....
The Health Care Reform Bill calls for a special excise tax on certain health benefit plans, beginning in 2018....Even though the effective date for the excise tax is over seven years away, accounting rules require that we reflect the cost of future retiree medical plan obligations in our financial statements. This potential new excise tax represents an additional multi-million dollar liability....Therefore, we are amending the retiree health plan to indicate that, if the excise tax is actually implemented in 2018 and taxes are owed, the cost of the taxes will be paid by the plan participants.
Anybody else receiving notices like this?
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Aug '10
Re: And So It Begins
Peter Robinson: From "Heath Care Reform Update," a letter distributed this week to employees of Stanford University:
A similar restriction is happening to our spending account. It is hard for me to put into words how wrong I think it is to be forbidden from using health spending account money for over-the-counter drugs.
Allowing people to use health spending account money to pay for over-the-counter drugs was to my mind a real step forward in controlling medication costs. And now it has been undone.
My family has many health problems, some of which respond only to expensive prescriptions. We used to offset the cost of these expensive drugs by using over-the-counter drugs for other problems whenever we could, paying for them with the HSA. But if the co-pay for a prescription is less than the over-the-counter price, there is no reason not to ask for a more absolutely expensive prescription, though the over-the-counter drug would have done the same job.
May '10
Re: And So It Begins
I did not know this was in there. I know we had to pass it to find out what was in it.
Jul '10
Re: And So It Begins
But, but...once people learn what's in the law, they're gonna love it....
May '10
Re: And So It Begins
And my portion of my healthcare premium where I work just went up by 31%; coincidence?
Jul '10
Re: And So It Begins
My wife's company paid someone to come in and explain what was happening. Apparently, one of the things they want to do is send health warnings to everyone's mobile phone if they're at McDonald's. Asked, "How would you respond to someone who said this all seems 'Big Brotherish,'" the presenter responded, "I'd say that I'd LOVE to have a big brother!"
This guy is, no joke, apparently going to work for the Obama administration.
Jul '10
Re: And So It Begins
Yes. All of the above.....lovely!